Full text of "On fortune's road; stories of business"

?s^SMss2s:z:szc?;^<z

-4-. Is?

».«».r.^,......., . ,1 -I. . | , - - | - | -| i r i rn-ri iii rV i i ii T |iii ir i ii>Kiiiiiiif TfniTii ii T"iii.'m^

Miss Grosvenor.

On Fortune's Road

Stories of Business

By
Will Payne

Author of " The Story of Eva/* ««The Money Captain," etc.

With Eight full-page drawings by Thomas Fogarty

Chicago

A. C. McClurg ^ Co.
1902

A. C. McClurg & Co.

1902

Published September 13, 1902

3 1211 00696944 4

CONTENTS

Page
In the Panic 1 1

A Day in Wheat ......... 39

The Plant at High Grove 75

The Chairman's Politics 137

The Lame Boy .171

The Salt Crowd's Trade 185

The End of the Deal 213

\7J^\'\

ILL USTRATIONS

Miss Grosvenor Frontispiece

PAGE

"Her touch quieted the young man" ... 28

** In the gallery" 50

•* Her humility touched his hard mood " . . . 126
** 'I'll admit I 'm a pirate. But who's going to

cast the first stone at me ? ' " . . . , 164

** A moment when youth should be triumphant " . 172

** * I like your nerve . . . What do you feed it on ? ' " 206
** The dusk . . . silently engulfed the object of her

search" 284

IN THE PANIC

On Fortune's Road

IN THE PANIC

TURNING the corner hurriedly, Miss
Grosvenor saw that the run had be-
gun. A file of savings-bank depos-
itors, already a rod long, reached from
the open door of the bank, forming along the inner
edge of the broad flagging under the supervision of
two policemen, making an odd little human fringe
to the base of the mountainous building that tow-
ered in glass and granite fourteen stories above
them.

Even as Miss Grosvenor passed, others came.
They seemed to spring out of the flagging. There
were working-men and a few dressed like clerks.
There were women, many of them shabby and of
a foreign aspect. One clutched a bank-book, and
with the other hand led a girl of eight or nine years,
who moved along with the slow procession docilely,
staring with a child's wonder. Nearer the door
was a young and well-dressed woman, who bit her
hp continually, and kept her eyes restlessly averted

1 1

IN THE PANIC

from those who passed along the street. One could
see that she was ashamed of being found in that
out-at-elbows company, of standing out there in
the street and confessing her anxiety for the few
dollars she had on deposit. All eyes turned again
and again to the open doorway ahead, through
which the line slowly marched. There were ner-
vous movements of lips and fingers. There was a
restrained eagerness in the slow pressing on to the
goal within, where the money lay.

The July sun beat down upon the stone sidewalk
and the stone street. Foot-passengers hurried along
the flagging. Wagons and cars rattled over the
pavement. On every side, interminably, square
after square of solid masonry arose. All seemed
commonplace, all seemed enduring. Only there
was this shabby little fringe like a human powder-
train at the base of the bank.

" Panic ! " the newspapers called it in staring
head-lines. Banks and commercial houses were go-
ing over like dominoes. Stocks were falling. No
man could borrow. All at once the firm ground of
credit had quaked and opened in fissures.

The big square banking-room, with its tile floor
and rosewood counters, looked enduring too. But
the file of besieging depositors wound around two
sides of it, ending at the brass wickets of the savings
department in the corner.

Mr. Miller, the president, stood at the door of
his small, glass-walled ofliice in the opposite corner.

IN THE PANIC

Behind his smiling face, picturesquely framed in a
pointed red beard, there was a certain blind resent-
ment against these shabby people. They were the
big, indubitable sign of that universal loosening and
unrest which he felt like rising waters licking at the
foundation of his bank. They advertised a dis-
trust of the bank as in letters a mile high, at a time
when to allay fear was to live, and to excite it was
to perish. Well, they would get no money. The
bank had at once taken advantage of that provision
of the law which permitted it to require sixty days'
notice before the withdrawal of savings deposits.
He felt like shouting to them, " Go away ! Keep
cool, and all the trouble will be over ! "

Then he saw Miss Grosvenor coming up to the
little gate in the rosewood railing before his office.
She smiled as their eyes met, and he waited for her to
come to him.

There was no time when this handsome sister-in-
law was not a satisfaction. But just now especially
the man looked down at her with a faint smiling,
which was a kind of confession. He liked even
her costume, which was a pale sort of blue with a
good deal of lace about it. The dress gave every
advantage of her pretty figure. He liked her
steady gray eyes and the dimple in her chin, and
the little parasol, fringed with lace, which he called
" swagger."

In his office, which was only ten feet square, Miss
Grosvenor took the chair at the end of the desk, and

IN THE PANIC

Miller sat facing her. His face was composed, but
there was still a faint smiling in his reddish-brown
eyes. Quite unexpectedly to her and even to him-
self, he said quietly :

" I take a lot of stock in you, Anne," and an
instant later he gave a little laugh at his own incon-
sequence.

But the woman understood. It was an expres-
sion of the good fellowship, the good understanding,
the affection, that lay between them. Even so
slight an expression from the undemonstrative man
touched her sharply. It made her feel, too, that the
crisis was actually at hand.

The financial details were dark to her, but her
imagination supplied light enough. She knew that
they were hanging by a thread and that something
was required of her. Her hands came together in
her lap. Her heart was beating rapidly. Her hps
parted from the effort of respiration. Her eyes
clung to Miller's face.

" Yes, Walter," she said, and the man knew that
she was ready.

Miller put his hand to his beard a moment.

"I sold your bank stock this morning," he said
quietly. " You and Clara had a hundred shares
apiece, you know. Of course Clara's will be gone
up if the bank fails. But I sold yours at par, and
I 've got the ten thousand dollars here for you now.
I want you to take it away. Naturally, if the bank
fails, I can't draw out any money to-morrow ; or,

IN THE PANIC

for that matter, I could n't get anybody to buy the
stock of a bank that had failed."

He smiled, and Miss Grosvenor understood that
this sale of the bank stock was some sort of fiction ;
that in effect he had bought it himself, and drawn
the money from the bank through some contrivance
or other.

He stooped, opened a drawer in his desk, and
took out a square package done up in yellow paper,
■ — just the sort of package one might come from a
store with, — and laid it on the corner of the desk
near her.

Miss Grosvenor looked down at the package.
For a moment she seemed unable to get her eyes
away from it. Miller felt in her the leap and quiver
of the nerves which one feels in a well-broken,
spirited horse that has been startled. In fact, her
enthusiasm for the service which Miller was to re-
quire of her abruptly died out. This seemed to her
so vulgar, so like taking somebody's spoons.

" What would you have me say if I were ques-
tioned about it ? " she asked in a low voice, her eyes
still on the package.

" Oh, it won't come to that," said Miller, coolly.
" At most, if the bank fails, this is only ten thou-
sand dollars out of twelve millions. This thing
could n't have come at a worse time for me. I 'm
a rich man, but I 've been running against the cur-
rent too long. Just now I 'm fearfully tied up. If
the bank fails, I don't know 's there 'd be a solitary

IN THE PANIC

dollar 1 could lay my hands on. I have some rights
here. The panic is n't my fault. I don't ask any-
thing for myself. But there are Clara and the children
at the sea-shore. You know what they need. I 'd be
ashamed of myself if I had n't the courage to look
out for them. And it just comes to that — to the
courage to maintain one's self. It 's a question of
self-appreciation. My wife and children were not
brought up to be beggars. I want to get this thing of
the wife and children's maintenance out of the way.
Then I can fight out the matter of the bank with a
free hand. I intend to pull it through yet."

The sound of resolution, of steadiness, in his
voice elevated her. She took up the package defi-
nitely and arose. She had a sense of coming into a
man's sphere of action, taking her part in a man's fight
— and she hated timorous women. Was not Walter
making his bigger fight ? It was part of her point
of view that in such a crisis his women should stand
by him and ask no questions, like those who loaded
the muskets in other circumstances. She walked
out of the office, her head up, with a touch of con-
scious erectness, carrying her yellow bundle con-
spicuously with a kind of pride.

At thje gate in the railing, looking out at the line
of besieging depositors, she saw a face in the line —
that of a girl whom she identified as one of Clara's
Sunday-school enthusiasms. The girl was looking
at her. But there was no sign of recognition on
Miss Grosvenor's part, and as though the girl had

IN THE PANIC

turned to her with a personal judgment, she gathered
herself proudly and swept out, carrying her yellow
package.

The girl had looked away quickly, confused at
having met Miss Grosvenor's eye. Now she moved
on patiently, a step at a time, with the slow line,
holding her bank-book in her hand. She was
not at all shabby, though Miss Grosvenor could at
once have told that her neat little blue jacket, from
the front of which the shirt-waist bosom puffily pro-
truded, and her becoming hat got their effect of
smartness with a small outlay of money. She was
perhaps eighteen. There was still a touch of
girlish color in her thin cheeks. Her dark hair was
smoothly parted over her white brow. Her dark
eyes kept turning to the wicket ahead. She had
long known whom she would meet there. His eyes
and hers had mutely exchanged glances. The
young man's face was distinctly German — young,
pale, with a jaunty Httle mustache and a roll of
dark hair above his high forehead. When the
girl came up to the wicket she spoke to him in
German.

" Well, Kurt, we thought it best to come," she
said.

" Yes — with the others ! " he said. There was
a touch of reproach in his tone, and he bent over
the pass-book without looking at her.

Minna saw that he took it as she had feared he
would ; and certainly it was not just nice to put
a 17

IN THE PANIC

Kurt's bank and Kurt's judgment thus under sus-
picion. She leaned close to the wicket and spoke
softly in her intimate German.

" Thou knowest how nervous papa is, especially
since he can get out no more. It is much to us,
this fifteen hundred dollars — all we have. He was
anxious. It was best to come, dear."

" Oh, yes, surely. It is right." The young
man looked up at her with a certain contrition and
with a quick outflow of affection. She was so
patient, so sweet, so good ! " Yes, it is right," he
repeated. " You give notice now, you understand,
aftd in sixty days — "

" Yes, I understand. Then, in sixty days we
can draw the money. If the bank does n't fail,
we will not wish to draw it; and if it should fail,
then we will be safe."

Kurt opened his lips to speak, to explain. But
he felt a helplessness against this ignorance. Why
say to her, " If the bank fails, your notice will
amount to nothing; you will lose your money just
the same " ?

Minna added, with a touch of gayety, " But cer-
tainly the bank will not fail."

" Oh, the bank fail ! Certainly not." Kurt smiled
indulgently, as though the bare suggestion called for
charity. The superior smile became quickly more
personal as he looked at her. " I will come down
to-night if I can," he said.

" Yes, do."

IN THE PANIC

Others were pressing for a place at the wicket,
and she nodded brightly, and turned away.

The young man's eyes sent a last glance after her
— the dear girl ! He went on with his work.
Three o'clock came. The front door was shut.
The file of depositors began to shorten, recruits
being cut ofF. The pressure of work lessened.
The clerks had the big bank to themselves. Two
of them, in the cage next to Kurt, were working
together over a ledger.

" Will the old shebang pull through ? " Kurt
heard one say in a low voice.

" Dunno," the other answered sullenly, "^e
a tight squeeze, I guess. You bet I drew my
money out yesterday — had to make a payment on
my house.'* The man drew the corner of his mouth
sarcastically, without looking up.

Kurt stared at them in blank astonishment. The
bank to fail ! Mr. Miller's bank ! What could the
fellows be dreaming of?

" Wish I had my money out of here," the other
muttered. " I 've a good mind to draw it right
now, rules or no rules." The man gave a rebel-
lious glance about, his nether lip protruding angrily.

Something came into Kurt's throat; but as yet he
was simply overwhelmed with astonishment. He
laid down his pen, and walked out of the cage in a
kind of daze. A small door behind the big vault
gave into a passage that led to a lavatory. Open-
ing this door, Kuit surprised Schwartz reading a

IN THE PANIC

newspaper. Schwartz was one of the bank's watch-
men. He regularly borrowed the paper that Kurt
got from the old folk in Hamburg. But it was the
" Daily News " that he was reading now, standing
in a corner of the passage, his watchman's cane
hung over his arm. He had folded the paper to
a narrow strip which he held up to the electric light,
reading clumsily through his glasses. As the door
opened, he started guiltily. But it was only Kurt.

" What 's up ? " the young man asked.

The watchman peered down the passage suspi-
ciously. Then he bent to Kurt, laying a heavy
hand on the youth's shoulder, and holding up his
newspaper.

" See, Kurt," he whispered in a guttural confi-
dence. " Barnes has failed, and so has the Packers'
Bank at Cincinnati. That means good-bye to Willy
Miller and this bank."

The youth looked up at him with a kind of appeal.
" God ! You don't mean the bank is going to
fail ? "

"Sure. They know it already up in front. They
are sending for the clearing-house committee.
Thomas told me, though Old Nick only knows
how Thomas knows. He knows everything."

Thomas was the watchman who stood near the
officers' desks, and " up in front " was the space
about Miller's office where the management sat.

Kurt went back to the teller's cage. His
hands worked on mechanically. He was think-

IN THE PANIC

ing of Minna. He had got them to deposit
the money in the bank. He had got them
to let it remain there. And Minna — the girl's
face kept coming up to him, so patient, so good,
working away with her little music-teaching and her
little German-teaching — a mere girl, too. Now
and then a start of hot tears came to his eyes as he
set his teeth together and boiled with a rage to rush
" up in front," and tear the money out of their hands
by main force.

Presently he heard the man next him saying
again, " I Ve a good mind to take my money right
now."

There were some packages of bills in the teller's
drawer in Kurt's cage.

After that the passage of time itself became fan-
tastical, so that little incidents stretched out intermi-
nably, and an hour went by in a wink, until he was
walking on Michigan Avenue, looking up at a big
house, Minna by his side.

He knew it was Miller's house, and that they
were going in.

As they turned from the flagging and began to
ascend the broad stone steps, there was a quailing in
the pit of his stomach. His nerves ached. But
Minna went up confidently, and pushed the bell-
button as though she lived there.

A footman appeared, holding the door only a little
ajar, his aged, chalky, large-boned face peering out
cautiously.

IN THE PANIC

Kurt was nearest the door. " From the bank,"
he said without premeditation. Minna stepped up
with a little friendly nod, and smiled as though she
were going in as a matter of course. Her face was
familiar enough, and at once the footman was throw-
ing the door wide open.

" Where is Mr. Miller ? " Minna asked.

" In the library," said the footman.

"This way," said Minna to Kurt, and the two
began to move down the hall, quite at home.

The footman stared after them a moment in mere
bewilderment. He made a move to overtake them.
But who could tell ? All sorts of people were com-
ing at will.

The second apartment on the right-hand side of
the hall was the music-room. Minna led the v/ay in
there without hesitation, knowing that the library
was just beyond. The room was unlighted. The
heavy doors to the drawing-room in front were
closed, but a light shone strongly between the cur-
tains that hung in the library door. It was abso-
lutely still. They advanced halfway across the
room, and stopped by a common impulse, for a
singular scene lay disclosed beyond the curving
curtains.

A dozen men sat about the long library table.
Their head-gear was carelessly disposed on the table
itself and on convenient chairs. Some of them were
smoking. Midway of the table a man with a lean,
colorless, square face, under bushy eyebrows and a

IN THE PANIC

shock of iron-gray hair, was figuring silently on a
big sheet of paper. Miller sat at the upper end of
the table. His brows were contracted in a slight,
anxious scowl. A half-smoked, unlighted cigar was
between the fingers of the hand that rested on the
table. With a kind of covert restlessness he watched
the man who was figuring. The other faces about
the table were waiting. One, next to Miller, was
stout, bald, and sanguine. A serene, well-composed
one framed in silver-white beard was farther down.
A big man whose double chin overflowed his shiny
white collar rested his plump white hands on the
table, and turned a pencil end for end with a silent,
nervous motion.

Kurt mechanically identified them one by one.
Each name stood for a great bank. In a moment
he caught the significance of the conjunction of
these names. It was the clearing-house committee,
— a Sanhedrim of finance. It could say that this
house should survive, that the other should perish.
It gave decisions from which there was no appeal.

Abruptly, without looking up, the chairman began
to speak.

'' You Ve tied up one million eight hundred thou-
sand dollars in one way and another in advances to
that Electrical Development Company of yours,
Miller, practically loans of the bank's funds to your-
self. What do you expect us to do for you ? "
he demanded. His hard gray eyes looked at Miller
challengingly.

IN THE PANIC

Kurt felt Minna's hand pulling on his arm. It
came to her then, with awe, that Miller, too, stood
before his judges. With noiseless steps she and
Kurt moved back toward the door.

" Not out in the hall," she whispered. "The
servants won't let us stay. Over here in the corner.
We won't listen."

They stole to the dim farthest corner and sat
down, shadowed by the big drama that had sud-
denly opened before them. They knew that Miller
stood up; that he was talking. At times a loud,
angry clash of voices came out to them. Then the
argument went on swiftly in lower tones.

Presently, without warning. Miller stepped to the
doorway. He rolled out first one and then the other
wing of the double door behind the curtains, closing
in the library and the committee, leaving himself in
the music-room. He walked rapidly to the hall,
disappearing. The waiting couple heard his step,
then, a moment later, a sound in the drawing-room
as though he had gone in there.

"Come," Minna whispered. They arose and
glided to the hall. But as they turned toward the
drawing-room door. Miss Grosvenor came running
down the stairs, and darted in there ahead of them.
They hesitated a moment, and drew back to the
music-room.

When Miss Grosvenor ran in, Miller sat on the
farther side of the room. He had slid far down in
his chair, his legs sprawling. He looked tired and

IN THE PANIC

worn. His linen was soiled with the dust and
sweat of the day. His reddish hair was rumpled.
There were dark lines under his eyes. She saw in
his face, in his attitude, a man tormented, pulled out
to the breaking point. A slight smile moved his
bearded lips, and she felt, too, that his courage suf-
ficed, that he had himself in hand.

She sat down quickly near him, leaning toward
him.

" How has it gone, Walter ? " she breathed.

"It hasn't gone yet, Anne," he replied quietly.
" It turns mostly on some loans that I 've made to
the Electrical Development Company. They say I
had no right to make them. So Buford is figuring
on taking that affair off my hands. He '11 cut d^ep
if he does it. You see, I 'm a lame duck just now,
and the question is whether it 's best to pluck me
altogether or just to take off a wing or so. A man
can do nothing. It 's all in their hands, and they will
decide it according to their jealousies and self-inter-
ests, and what not."

" But if they decide against you ? "

"Then it's all up." He spoke quite serenely.

" It is n't fair ! " Miss Grosvenor exclaimed
fiercely under her breath. She looked angrily in
the direction of the library. She felt a big rage
against this committee that was calmly deliberating
Miller's fate. " There is no justice in it," she went
on hotly. " I hope you '11 use every advantage you
can get. A man ought to."

IN THE PANIC

Miller gave a little laugh.

"Yes, that 's what the committee thinks," he said.

" Oh, well — " Miss Grosvenor began ; then she
checked herself. " I suppose it 's the rule all around,"
she added helplessly.

"Yes, it's the rule," said Miller. "I don't
know 's it's so bad a rule, take it all around.
Otherwise, I suppose I 'd be running a little grocery
store, as my father began doing. Only if a man
happens to be the under dog — " the banker sighed.
" Well, we must wait."

For some minutes neither spoke. The stillness
grew oppressive. To the woman they seemed in
some way cut off from the world, waiting. In spite
of her striving, fear stole over her — a big fear.
She felt its crushing weight at the centre of her
heart. She had an inexpressible wish to escape, to
be softly snatched away, to slip back at once to some
dreamed condition of sweetness and security.

Then both she and Miller were aware of a soft
stir in the hall, of some mumbled words. The face
of the old footman appeared in the doorway, dubious,
bewildered, apologetical. Directly behind him ap-
peared a young woman and a young man.

Miss Grosvenor was mechanically identifying the
girl as the one she had seen in the line of depositors
— Clara's Sunday-school enthusiasm. Miller rec-
ognized the young man as one of his clerks.

The footman melted ineffectually away, and the
two young people stepped into full view. Minna

IN THE PANIC

crossed the threshold first. Kurt stepped to her
side, and the two waited, picture-like. The girl's
soft eyes passed over Miss Grosvenor and rested on
Miller. Kurt was quite white. A package wrapped
in newspaper protruded from the pocket of his sack-
coat, and one hand rested upon it. His straw hat
was in the other hand. His wave of hair was dis-
ordered. He had eaten nothing since the hasty bite
at noon. He had worked hard and suffered. There
was a quailing in his stomach, and he felt a kind of
cold limpness in his nerves and sinews. But he was
standing up by Minna without faltering. She had
shown him what to do. There was no motion in
his mind of drawing back. The girl spoke.

"There has been a mistake, Mr. Miller. Kurt
has made a mistake, and we wished to see you about
it — without waiting." Her voice was clear and
sweet, like her face. The note of youth and inno-
cence was in it.

Miller waited, completely surprised. As for Miss
Grosvenor, her eyes were on Minna.

" He was a teller to-day," the girl went on
steadily. " I had some money in the bank. He
had deposited it there for me. He heard, or thought,
that the bank might fail, so I would lose the money.
He was excited and confused. So he drew out the
money for me. Then we saw that was n't right.
The bank might — might — " In the moment of
faltering over the right word to express their doubt
respecting the bank, her eyes fell, and by a subtle

IN THE PANIC

inflection Miss Grosvenor felt at once all the effort
it had cost this girl to make her simple declaration.
Miss Grosvenor's eyes were still fixed on the girl's
face, and there was an odd constriction at her heart.

"It might be too late to-morrow, sir," Minna
went on, looking up at Miller again. " So we came
to-night."

" Yes," said Miller, kindly.

" We brought back the money," Minna added.
She looked at Kurt.

The young man took the package from his
pocket, as though her look had given him the cue.
He started forward nervously and laid the package on
a chair, as Miller did not offer to take it. He
stood very close to Miss Grosvenor, but he seemed
not aware of her. He was looking only at the
banker.

" I was put on in the savings department to
help out to-day," he began rapidly. His voice
shook, and the hand next Miss Grosvenor, with
which he fumbled for his pocket, trembled visibly.
" I could n't bear that she should lose her money.
It 's all they have, and her father is n't well. So —
I took it, sir. I took it and signed her name to a
receipt." Tears started to his eyes. He was over-
wrought. " I took it," he repeated. " I will con-
fess it anywhere — anywhere that — " He choked
over the word.

Minna stepped beside him and slipped her hand
through his arm.

^' Her touch quieted the young man'*'*

IN THE PANIC

" He did n't think," said her clear, steady voice.
" As soon as he thought it over, he saw it was
wrong."

Her touch quieted the young man. His hand
still fumbled tremulously about his pocket. He bit
his lip.

Miller's eyes were downcast. " I understand,"
he said in a low voice, without looking up. " You 'd
best take the money back to the bank in the
morning."

"But if the bank should — shouldn't — " Kurt
stopped helplessly.

There was a pause. Then the banker lifted his
eyes to the two faces above him.

" Yes, the bank may not be open to-morrow,"
he said quietly ; and with a quick throb that was in
some way one of pain as much as of pleasure. Miss
Grosvenor felt him coming up to this situation —
as trying in its way as the larger one — with the
same steady courage.

" So — we could n't give it back then — maybe —
and we came to you," Minna exclaimed. Miller's
suggestion had evidently confused her. She looked
at him in a troubled way.

" That is, you take me for the bank ? " he asked,
with a touch of a smile.

" Why — of course, it seemed so — " Minna
was answering, and she was still evidently confused.

Miller smiled a little more. He looked up at the
girl kindly.

IN THE PANIC

" Well, take the money home," he said. " Keep
it. I say so. Now that it 's done, it does n't
matter. You need n't bother about it."

Nothing could have been more kindly than the
banker's manner. There was even an affectionate
quality in it. Kurt stared his surprise.

Minna's lips parted. Her eyes shone softly.
Her surprise was very pretty. But in an instant
she seemeji confused again. A little line came in
her forehead ; she looked at the banker in a troubled,
appealing way.

u But — but — is that right, Mr. Miller?" she

pleaded.

The banker still looked at her with his faint,
kindly smile. Even her confusion was charming,

" I say so," he said. " And I am the bank, am
I not?"

ugut — but — " The line in her brow grew
deeper. Abruptly tears sprang to her eyes. Her
graceful body bent appealingly toward the banker.
« We are poor people, Mr. Miller," she cried out in
distress. " We don't understand these things. But
Kurt must n't do wrong. You see that."

The appeal came straight out of her youth and
innocence and love. Miller stood up. His hand
went out, and for a second touched her shoulder
lightly.

" Yes, yes," he said quickly ; " I see that.
Leave the money here. It is better. You have
done right." He glanced at the young man,

IN THE PANIC

and repeated, as for him, " You have done
right."

" Thank you," said the girl, shyly and uselessly.
The two made as to go. But Minna turned back,
still very close to Miller, looking into his face.
"You won't blame Kurt ? " she said softly.

" Not a bit," said Miller. " If the bank stays he
will stay."

" Thank you," she said again.

" Thank you, sir," said the young man, and they
went out together.

For an instant both Miller and Miss Grosvenor
looked down at the package of money wrapped in a
newspaper. Miss Grosvenor was first to speak.

" I suppose I might put it with my ten thousand,"
she said with a short and bitter laugh.

In the instant she felt herself put aside in some
subtle way as being ineffectual, unhelping, unim-
portant. She had the sense of a queer, potential
sort of kinship between that gentle, unknowing girl
and the hardy, sophisticated banker. The girl's
courage matched his, and her own courage in taking
the money seemed so poor, so shabby. It was like
being found without one's clothes. She felt that in
some way she had failed her brother-in-law — and
she liked him so well.

Abruptly she bent forward and clapped her hands
to her face.

" It makes me ashamed, Walter," she said, her
head bowed.

IN THE PANIC

Miller looked down at her sympathetically. The
picture of youthful love and innocence which had
been before them made its appeal to him, too.

" Yes, our lost paradise," he said kindly. " It 's
pretty. It 's beautiful. But if we 're to go back to it,
you know, we must go back to the grocery store, too,
or to something even simpler than that. A house on
Michigan Avenue and a place at the sea-shore
mean things not paradisal. You can't make a
fortune or keep one in Eden. That girl can do it,
of course, and she can make her young man do it.
But we 've paid a good deal for our sophistication.
And don't we like the sophistication pretty well, too ?
Would you rather be Miss Grosvenor of Michigan
Avenue or Anne What 's-her-name of Halsted
Street ? "

Miss Grosvenor dropped her hands in her lap and
looked down at them rather pathetically. " I think
I 'd rather be Anne What 's-her-name — if I could,"
she said in a low voice.

The picture that had been before them troubled
her heart. That other girl seemed to come straight
out of the dreamed condition of sweetness and
security. Her courage had been so fine, so beauti-
ful. Miss Grosvenor looked up at Miller appeal-
ingly.

"That ten thousand dollars, Walter," she said
plaintively.

" Yes," said Miller ; " it 's uncomfortably naked,
I admit. It 's a trick. But, in the main, it 's no

IN THE PANIC

difFerent from a lot of other things. A good many
other ten thousands that go to the making of a Miss
Grosvenor or a charitable Mrs. Miller have about
the same flavor. For my part, I think they 're worth
while. I like the money. Of course the other
thing does appeal. It — does seem — safe." He
let the words drop one by one, and looked steadily
at his sister-in-law. " Still, if you wish, the ten
thousand will go back to the bank."

He sat down as leaving it all to her. Miss Gros-
venor was tracing lines with her finger over the arm
of her chair.

" Oh, I don't know," she sighed helplessly.

After a while she heard the snapping of Miller's
watch-case. It was growing late. The stillness of
the house again oppressed her. In some way it
seemed like the emptiness of her life. She had no
more argument. She simply sat, waiting. There
grew up in her a conviction that the decision would
be against them. If only in some way she could
begin over again I

It seemed to her that she felt before she heard
the stirring at the library door ; with a sense other
than hearing quailed from the strident cry, " Oh,
Miller!"

Miller arose. For an instant, as he stepped
toward the door, he looked at her, his eyebrows
drawn in a scowl which expressed simply a stubborn,
belligerent readiness. She felt his courage, but it
did not help her.

3 33

IN THE PANIC

During the long wait that followed she had a fear
of stirring, lest the slightest motion might in some
way touch off the avalanche and bring the very-
house crashing about her.

At intervals the murmurous sound of voices
reached her through the closed door. After a while,
she knew that the men were coming into the hall.
There was a sound of steps and of voices. Once
or twice she heard a subdued laugh. The front door
was opening and closing as the men went out rap-
idly in groups.

Then the door closed with a kind of definiteness.
It was still. She knew it was all over, whatever it
was. She took her nether lip between her teeth
and laid her hands tightly on the arms of her
chair.

Miller appeared in the doorway. His face
seemed composed. He stepped across swiftly and
stooped slightly above her chair. Then she saw
a quiet smiling, and she knew at once before he
said :

" It 's all right, Anne. The bank won't fail."

She sprang up, stammering, " Oh, Walter ! "
The next instant he had put his arm over her
shoulder comfortingly as though she were a child,
and she was crying a little.

" It was trying, was n't it ? " he said soothingly.
" But it 's all right now."

Suddenly Miss Grosvenor made a pirouette,
whirling clear around, and faced him again, beaming.

IN THE PANIC

She was babbling over with happiness. She did not
philosophize, but at once, as though a bad dream
had gone by, she felt her life, full, warm, sparkling
as ever.

" It 's just splendid I " she declared in simple,
pointless exuberance.

Miller smiled down at her. " Yes, it 's all right,"
he said.

Her eyes fell on the package wrapped in news-
paper. " Oh, and now the poor things won't lose
their money. I *m so glad of that ! "

It seemed to her the crowning stroke of good
fortune. She threw back her head and gave a laugh.
" But I believe I '11 keep my ten thousand, now that
I have it," she declared.

Miller looked down at her humorously, perhaps a
little satirically. " Yes, it 's a good joke now, is n't
it? " he said.

Miss Grosvenor sobered. She looked down a
moment. When she lifted her eyes he saw doubt
in them.

" Was it just because I was afraid — a little while
ago ? " she asked.

" That you wanted to be so good ? " Miller re-
plied,"^ and laughed. "Well, being afraid is a
powerful incentive to goodness." He laughed
again and put out his hands and caught her by the
shoulders.

" You see it is n't worth while to be afraid," he
said. " Keep your head up and your hand steady.

IN THE PANIC

Isn't it better to be Miss Grosvenor than Anne
What 's-her-name ? "

" Yes — now," she admitted.

But after she had gone upstairs to her own room,
in blue and gold, she kept thinking, " Was it just
because I was afraid ? "

A DAY IN WHEAT

A DAT IN PTH EA T

A VICTORIA drawn by shining bays,
the coachman in drab livery faced with
yellow, wheeled up to the curb on the
east side of the Board of Trade.
Miss Thatcher did not at once offer to alight.
She reefed her gaudy little parasol, and looked de-
liberately up the craggy bulk of granite that towered
overhead. She was aware, as parts of the picture,
of the windowed broadside of the bank blocking
their dingy bit of street just to the north, and of the
awkward mass of the elevated-road station shutting
off the view to the south. An inarticulate roaring
of human voices came out of the broad, open
windows above.

'*• How much noise they make ! " she commented,
gathering her skirts.

" They 're always at the boiling-point," said Miss
Gund, briskly, with the advantage of her experience.
" I hope they '11 boil over for you. Maybe Arthur
can get them to. We may as well get out."

Miss Thatcher's eye had been quick to catch the
gilt signs on the two windows and the door across

A DAY IN WHEAT

the sidewalk : " Gund, Randall & Morehouse :
Stocks, Bonds, Grain, Provisions." That, and the
mere glimpse beyond of a big bare room full of
lounging men, were rather disappointing — not so
suggestive of money and excitement as she had
supposed.

She^ alighted in a leisurely way. Shorter and
plumper Miss Gund followed her with a bounce
which seemed rather due to the environment.
Everybody hurried there, even those passing men
who turned briefly challenging eyes upon the tall,
alluring figure beside the carriage. Miss Thatcher
did not mind the glances here more than elsewhere.
It was an advantage of her size and beauty that she
could stand calmly aloof.

But Miss Gund was less serene. "This is the
office," she said. " Oh ! "

The office door opened, and a large young man
came hurrying out to them. His big, loose frame
moved with a kind of awkwardness, and he took off
his straw hat, someway as though he wished to hide
it, disclosing a long, narrow brow, and a thinness in
the lightish hair over the top of his head. But his
long, smooth face was distinguished in a way by the
amiable mouth and the mutely eloquent brown eyes.
He briefly, even hurriedly, shook the neatly gloved
hand which Miss Thatcher extended.

" Is it a good day for us, Arthur ? " Dora cut in
at once ; and his one tiny hope that, after all, they
were not going to stay, fell to pieces.

•40

A DAY IN WHEAT

" Why, no ; it is n't really a very good day," he
began. His troubled eyes even made an appeal to
Miss Thatcher.

" Perhaps you 're too busy," she suggested. She
mentally drew herself up.

" Oh, I 'm sure it 's a good day," said Dora, with
sisterly privilege. " I read the ' Tribune's ' Board
of Trade column to Margaret before we started, and
it says the market is ' wildly nervous.' That 's
good for us, is n't it ? We want it to be lively."

" But if you 're busy — " Miss Thatcher insisted.
His was not the attitude which she had reason to
expect.

But Arthur had come out of his helplessness. It
was apt to be that way with him — as though it
took his machinery a few minutes to get into run-
ning order.

" I meant the gallery will be crowded," he ex-
plained lamely but amiably. " Of course I 'm not
too busy. I 'm only a sort of flourish in the office
as yet, anyway."

They started across the flagging.

"Oh, and will the 'bull clique' be up there, —
the one the ' Tribune ' says is running the market ?
How shall we know it ? Can you point it out ? "

Dora paused at the door to put these questions
with a touch of excitement.

" I hope it will come out and perform for us,"
said Miss Thatcher. " What is it they do ? ' Go
broke ' ? Will it do that ? "

A DAY IN WHEAT

A little panicky constriction caught the young
man's heart.

" Perhaps ; I '11 ask them to ! " he cried in
nervous recklessness. But Miss Thatcher was pass-
ing him to enter the door. Her beauty was too near;
it was too real. His eyebrows drew together. " I
hope they won't ' go broke ' anywhere, Miss
Thatcher," he said in a sort of hurried aside.

It made a commotion in her nerves — perhaps
not an unpleasant commotion. What an odd
speech !

She affected not to hear, and she glanced calmly
at the strange scene — a big bare room, with a space
at the left divided off by a cheap partition of stained
wood and ground glass, the remaining space mostly
filled with chairs, in and over and about which
men lounged. There were some big blackboards,
whereon two boys nimbly entered chalk figures.
It struck her as decidedly unkempt and smelling
of tobacco.

They crossed the width of the office, and were
nearing the door which gave into the main hall of
the building. In the corner was a small den parti-
tioned off with the same stained pine and ground
glass that made the larger division.

" Oh, here 's papa's hole," said Dora, cheerfully.
" Is he in ? Let 's speak to him."

" He 's busy," Arthur warned hurriedly.

But Dora had already stepped aside, tapped at the
small glass door, and was opening it and peering in.

A DAY IN WHEAT

" Shut that door ! Go away ! " said a high,
peremptory voice from within.

Miss Thatcher recognized the voice of Peter
Gund, and her face became blankly composed.
Instantly she felt a sort of dismal failure in her
expedition. This bare, unkempt room, with its
air of cheapness, that example of courtesy from
Gund, Senior — in away it seemed to justify her
father's estimate of them, or, at least, of Peter.
She knew her father's attitude well enough. Fi-
nally he had said to her : " Young Gund always
seems to me like Peter's savageness trying to
wriggle into an acceptable form."

That had been after Arthur Gund's second even-
ing call, which had been his last ; for Miss Thatcher
believed in loyalty to one's father — at least, up
to a certain point. Lately she had thought a
good deal ; and if now she kept her eyes steadily
averted from Arthur, it was because she had a
rebellious instinct to keep him apart from Peter's
vulgarity.

Dora flushed hotly, and they went into the hall
considerably under the cloud of Peter's manners.

" It certainly sounds ' wildly nervous,' " Miss
Thatcher commented.

As they ascended the broad, curving granite stairs
to the trading-floor, a roaring strife of voices gushed
down to them.

As soon as Margaret spoke, Dora saw that her
chance had gone by ; for in the space of a second

A DAY IN WHEAT

she had meditated a feminine defence against Miss
Thatcher's judgment of Peter. It had been on the
tip of her tongue to say, " Your father was in there,
too."

Perhaps Miss Thatcher would have received it
incredulously. It was quite beyond her conception
of her father that he had sat by and silently admired
Gund's curt dismissal of his daughter as though she
were a trespassing boot-black.

The two men sat at opposite sides of the small
table in the little den — Franklin Thatcher, a tall
man with a formal and military suggestion because
of his clothes, his square shoulders, his grizzled
moustache and imperial. One could guess that he
was fond of a silk hat. It was easy to imagine the
background of his establishment on the Lake Shore
Drive. Peter Gund was a mere post of a man,
weighing about one hundred pounds, partly bald,
with a smooth, thin face, and a tuft of whitish
moustache, his complexion a faintly blotched and
mottled red, no eyebrows, and puffy, wrinkled lids
that commonly drooped over the watery, weary-
looking pale-blue eyes.

The threat of feminine intrusion delivered by
Dora intolerably stung Thatcher's straining nerves,
and at Gund's prompt " Go away ! " he looked up
with new regard.

For at that moment something like three million
dollars lay at hazard, and the dice must be thrown
at once.

A DAY IN WHEAT

Every second impassively clicked off by the elec-
tric clock on the wall narrowed the margin within
which a fortune might be saved, and Peter Gund
was not one to let courtesy distract the steady eye
with which he measured the chances.

The big wheat deal was in a desperately bad
way. Money had tightened unexpectedly. It was
almost impossible to borrow on any terms. When
Thatcher began to buy wheat in February with
Sheahan and Tomlins (the three constituting the
mysterious " bull clique "), he had proposed merely
one of those speculative adventures with which he
sometimes varied his leisurely occupation of " cap-
italist," as the city directory designated him. But
Pat Sheahan's was a more ardent temperament, and,
through stages which he could now scarcely account
for, Thatcher found himself and his partners in a
position where they must buy more or ruinously
throw over the big line they had accumulated. He
had felt uneasy for days ; but the fear that strikes
cold to the pit of a man's stomach and loosens all
his nerves had not touched him until this very
morning. Then, coming rapidly to the office of
Gund, Randall & Morehouse, his straining eye
sought the senior partner. The two went without
a word to that little den in the corner. The door
was closed. Thatcher took ofF his hat, and drew
his hand across his brow.

" Pat 's fallen down," he said ; *' can't borrow a
dollar." The bull clique's reserve force had been

A DAY IN WHEAT

Sheahan's supposed ability to arrange a certain large
loan. It looked like Waterloo, with no Grouchy in
sight.

Thatcher understood well enough, in his half-
benumbed helplessness, that if the desperate situation
was to find its younger Napoleon anywhere, it must
be in this mere post of a man opposite. Even in the
distress which confused his mind, he was conscious of
a color of contrition. He and Gund had known each
other a long time, and he had to own that as between
them Gund's attitude had been the franker. As for
himself, he had cherished reservations, especially of
late, after he had set up that more pretentious estab-
lishment on the Lake Shore Drive, and Margaret
had come home quite " finished." In his heart he
felt that Peter was a stranger to the significance of
a silk hat. Just now the reservations seemed infi-
nitely unimportant. That million of his own which
lay at hazard dwarfed everything else. It was the
pedestal on which he stood, with the other lords of
the town, that went on under its smoke, amid its
din, in its endless stretches of grimy streets, ready
enough to pay him the consideration he asked so
long as he could maintain his position ; instantly
ready, also, if he fell, to distort its vast visage in a
derisive grin, to set its huge foot on him, and forget
him in a day. He even thought — the straw-clutch
of a drowning man — to ask Peter to come into the
breach with his fortune. But he had to own that
Peter had been generous. If he failed he would stand

A DAY IN WHEAT

In Gund, Randall & Morehouse's books for a sum
which most men would be richly content to retire
from money-getting with.

" You 're in a devil of a box," said Gund, looking
thoughtfully at the sheets of paper before them. He
drew a match with a long scratch across the under
edge of the table, and lighted the big black cigar
between his teeth. The teeth were glitteringly
false. This, of course, was only the prelude, and
Thatcher fetched a tremulous sigh.

" But it ain't so bad," Gund went on thoughtfully.
'••You 've got a chance, I guess. Sheahan and Tom-
lins have some money left, for they 're supporting
the market right now. Sheahan *s got a big credit
with the trade, and a big following. He's black
Irish, and he '11 fight like the devil. Besides, he 's a
clever man, and knows how to fight. He may
stand up for a couple of days. The deal can't win;
it 's bound to go to smash in the end." He lifted
his weary-looking eyes, half veiled by the pufFy lids,
to Thatcher's face, and added kindly: "The thing
for you to do, Franklin, is to sell out — unload on
'em — let them hold the bag before the smash
comes."

Thatcher's eyes dropped to the table.

Gund considered the memoranda a moment.
" 'Y gad, it will work first-rate, I believe," he
declared more briskly. "Wait a minute."

He jumped up and ran to the outer office to verify
a fact or so.

A DAY IN WHEAT

To Thatcher's expert understanding the proposi-
tion was quite plain. It meant that he should sur-
reptitiously sell his wheat in the market to his
partners, and by betraying them to complete ruin
save a part of his own fortune.

All his life he had cherished a certain gentlemanly
conception of himself. Yet he did not leap back
from Gund's suggestion. What he felt was a sort
of sickness, a sort of tremulous incapacity to do the
necessary thing. It was like saving his life — or
more. If it could be done at a stroke, one desper-
ate lunge of the knife, a pressure of the trigger with
shut eyes and clenched teeth — but his mind was
sufficiently awake to realize that it must be a more
elaborate and detailed treachery. Sheahan was no
fool. If he was to be confidenced out of his money,
some carefully planned betrayals would be necessary.
Then the accounting afterwards ! He saw Sheahan
confronting him — a big, coarse, half-illiterate brute.
The overwhelming sickness in his mind increased.

Gund, darting back to the stall, found his client
standing by the door. The client avoided the pale
eyes. In his soul in that moment, before the man
of daring counsel, he felt rather abject and futile.

" We '11 let this go for the present, Peter," said
Thatcher, with downcast eyes, in a low voice, in a
way that half entreated the other's forbearance. " I
believe I can raise some money ; I'm going to try."

" But, thunder ! you can't," said Gund. " Can't
borrow a dollar."

A DAY IN WHEAT

" Yes ; I believe I can, " Thatcher repeated.
" I 'm going to try."

"Wheat's weaker now; you'll be too late," the
broker warned. " This market ain't going to wait
for anybody."

" I won't be long. Give me a chance. I 'm not
up to this other business — now." He grew firmer
as he argued. " My account with you — "

Peter made a gesture. " If you 're going, go
quick. The minutes count."

Thatcher hurried out.

Gund stood a full minute, worrying his little
whitish moustache. Then he walked slowly into the
main hall of the Board, and on up the curving
granite stairs to the trading-room, all the time fin-
gering his moustache and looking down thoughtfully.
At his back, through the windows, lay a fine per-
spective of La Salle Street, walled by its towering
buildings, its flaggings and roadway full of constantly
shifting masses. Before him was the high and broad
trading-room, with its three packs of shouting, ges-
ticulating brokers, — packs which seemed to be con-
stantly drawing in the loose human atoms on the
floor and casting them forth again. But Gund had
no eye either for the panorama behind the wide
windows or for the clamoring packs before him.
He strolled out upon the floor, quite oblivious of all
the pandemonium, still busily worrying his moustache
and looking down. He was addressed here and
there, stopped, questioned. He answered with a
4 49

A DAY IN WHEAT

word absently, and strolled on. Only here and there
he spoke a word on his own account, — catching the
eye of a broker, calling him up by a mere indication
from those pufFy eyelids, leaning to speak for an
instant, then passing on. And as Peter's saunter-
ings and whisperings progressed, an habitue could
have told from the shoutings, from the manner in
which the fingers of those flourished, gesticulating
hands were held, that the market was turning.

" Now what does it mean ? " Miss Thatcher
asked.

" Five eighths," Arthur replied, half absorbed in
the market. He spread his fingers and made the
sign for her.

" That 's less, then ? " she asked doubtfully.

" Yes ; it 's going ofF fast."

He leaned over the edge of the railing, watch-
ing the pit. Miss Thatcher watching him. " That-
cher 's catching it hot and heavy," he was think-
ing. " How grotesque, her being up here ! But,
thank God, nobody knows her; and she is here —
beside me ! " He looked around at her, smiling.

The ten minutes which she had at first proposed
had grown to twenty. It was unexpectedly snug up
there in the gallery, beside the big sheltering pillar.
They had the farther end quite to themselves.
Dora had gone back to look into the street through
the top of a broad window. The great trading-floor
spread out below them, with its three shouting packs,
its many rows of high little tables over which men

/// the gallery ' '

A DAY IN WHEAT

seemed more sanely busy, and its open space where
men continually crossed and recrossed, gathering,
gossiping, pointing, dispersing. Over the heads of
that mob there was an odd air of seclusion. The
very noise made a better place for them to be still
in.

He explained some things, but the explanations
mostly went wide of her understanding. She pre-
ferred to understand him. She asked a question
now and then at random, and observed him, con-
scious of her own little secret drama in which she
was assigning him a part, but not dreaming of the
big drama of the pit as it appeared to him, and
in which, to him, she was the innocent figure. He
leaned forward, watching and listening. She knew
it for a battle. It subtly charged her nerves with
its electrical atmosphere. It was as though they
had been together in a storm. Words, gestures,
the ordinary means of approach, were not needed.
There was fusion in the air. They drew near to
each other by insensible processes.

" You find it really interesting ? " she asked mur-
murously, without caring what his answer might be.
She simply wished him to feel her presence.

He drew back a little, and gave her his attention.

" Why, it 's really a big trade," he said. " I
think a fellow 's bound to do something. Of course "
— he dropped his eyes — "I suppose there are a
lot finer things to do." He got over the self-depre-
ciatory implication by looking up at her. " One

A DAY IN WHEAT

ought to do the best he can, and this is really a big
business, — that is, the best part of it : the ' cash
wheat ' business, — buying, storing, shipping grain,
and all that."

" Of course it 's important," she said quickly,
with a completeness of approval which he found not
at all marred, but rather improved, when she added,
" if one can understand it."

She looked thoughtfully across the floor. They
seemed to be confessing something to each other.

" After all, Chicago does do a good deal ; and if
you 're of Chicago — "

" Certainly ! " he caught it up quickly. " My
father, in a way, has made a place here, — made a
foundation, — and why should n't I go on with it ? "

Miss Thatcher's hands came together in her lap.
" Yes," she said deliberately ; " I 've felt the same
thing myself of late."

Such was the effect of this demure speech that the
young man had a thrilling sense, which remained for
half a minute, that they fully understood each other.

" I like to see a man do something," she added
quite recklessly; and then, as though daring could
go no further, — the words did not matter, — she
looked him in the face. She did not mind electrify-
ing him. In a certain soft rebellion she took his
surface disadvantages into the fold of her protecting
affection, so that it was then really much better for
him than if he had been able to make his own ad-
vances gracefully — than if he had been of the most

A DAY IN WHEAT

plausible form. It was her way of paying him for
his awkwardness.

The two human figures in the lee of the big
pillar in the gallery presented no suggestion of the
denouement of a play. Peter Gund, happening to
glance up, saw two idle spectators of the wheat-pit;
then he made out the yellow hair and the hat and
Arthur. He was too busy to be definitely amused,
but he thought, " Nice time for Thatcher's daughter
to be studying the wheat market ! " and he even had
a fleeting sense of typical youth and beauty looking
on at the battle and pretending to study it, but really
too full of its own comedy to understand anything
else.

He moved along, and gave another order to sell
wheat. For if Franklin Thatcher did n't know
enough to sell out on his partners, Peter Gund knew
enough to sell out on his client. He had made up his
mind that Thatcher would fail to raise the money
to support the market — that he was about to lose.
The failure of the bull clique meant necessarily a
big drop in the price of wheat. From this conclu-
sion and this fact Gund moved promptly and char-
acteristically to the action of selling wheat on his
own account, so that he would profit by whatever
decline occurred. He explained briefly to Randall,
whom he found down in the office, nervously slip-
ping two silver dollars between his fingers, his white-
felt hat on the back of his fat head. Gund sidled
up to him.

A DAY IN WHEAT

" Guess Thatcher 's gone to pot, sure," he said in
an aside. " He 's trying to borrow some money,
but he can't do it. I 've just been upstairs," — he
glanced up at his partner, — " and I Ve sold a
slough of wheat for our own account. If those
fellows pull through, we '11 have to cover it at a loss.
But I 'm guessing they won't pull through. If they
don't, we '11 make enough on this stuff I 've just sold
to square what Thatcher '11 owe us, and more, too.
You might go upstairs and watch it ; but don't try
to cover without seeing me."

Not long afterwards, Gund stood before an electric
printing-machine in his office, and read this :

" The market is turning strong again. The big
selling seems to be over. Good buying now; price
up three cents from the bottom : supposed to be the
clique."

Randall hurried in, — his third trip from upstairs.

" I 'm dead sure Thatcher is buying through
Judson," he began excitedly.

" S-s-s-st ! " said Peter, for Thatcher was coming
in.

Gund went to meet him.

"It's all right, Peter," he began at once; "all
right ! " He stooped and laid a hand confidentially
on the small man's arm. " I went to Judson
because — "

" Are you buying ? " Gund cut in.

Thatcher vaguely felt himself accused. " I went
to Judson because I did n't see you when I came

A DAY IN WHEAT

back from the bank," he explained, "and there
was n't any time to lose. Besides, Judson 's been
pretty hard hit with Tomlin's and Sheahan 's busi-
ness. Been called for margins, in fact, and had n't
responded ; so I thought it only fair to — "

" You raised the money ? " Peter looked up,
really astonished.

"Yes; I got the money, — hundred and twenty
thousand."

" Pshaw ! " said Peter, an exclamation of incredu-
lous admiration. " I did n't think it could be done."

" Yes ; it could be done," said Thatcher.

It seemed to Gund's intent eye and ear that there
was a kind of confusion and recklessness somewhere
behind Thatcher's words.

" I congratulate you," said Peter, calmly.

Thatcher felt an aloofness, an accusation, and it
added to the trouble in his mind. "See here,
Peter," he began. He slipped his hand through the
broker's arm, and turned him toward the big hall,
leading him, as though walking helped him on with
it. "I — it was the girl's money."

" The girl's ? "

"My girl's — Margaret's. It's the right thing
to do. It will pull us all out. I did n't — really
didn't hesitate — "

Peter's weary and watery eye took an upward and
sidelong glance, calmly, at the tall figure. He felt
the rattling and shaking of overburdened machin-
ery. He recalled briefly the fortune left by Mar-

A DAY IN WHEAT

garet's mother, of which the father was the trustee.
But he had his own work on hand.

" How much ? " he asked with brutal directness.

" One hundred and twenty thousand dollars. It
was all very available, — good bonds and stocks."
Thatcher's white hand went up to the military
tuft of hair on his chin. " It will pull us all
through," he said. "You see, the tide has turned
now. It just needed that to get us around the
corner. I knew it could n't last, Peter," he added,
with pathetic emphasis. " Of course if you felt
like turning in and buying now, it would be a
chance for you to make something. The tide has
turned." He drew himself up a little.

" All right," said Gund, vaguely, and he went
back into the office. But he halted, just out of
Thatcher's sight, and twisted his moustache. He
gave a glance at the clock. The time was very
short. The bold play that he had made in selling
wheat was in jeopardy. If Thatcher and Sheahan
should regain control of the market, he would have
to buy in that wheat at a loss. The time was very
short. And Thatcher's hundred and twenty thou-
sand dollars, — the girl's money (which meant it
was the last the bull clique could raise), — part of
which had already been swallowed up in helping
Judson out of his " hole " ! What an ass Thatcher
was ! Gund started forward, walked deliberately
through the hall, up the stairs, and out on the
trading-floor. The big clock showed that he had

A DAY IN WHEAT

only thirty minutes left. Again he sauntered among
the brokers, speaking his confidential word.

A little later the electric machine said :

"Tremendous line of wheat coming on the
market. Price weakening. Crowd thinks the clique
is unloading. All sorts of rumors, — one that a
clique broker is in trouble. Wildest sort of market."

" There 's your father now," said Margaret.

" Yes," said Arthur, without looking around.
He was leaning forward, watching the pit, and his
nerves felt the crisis.

" Gad ! See 'er slide ! " Randall murmured, in
a kind of rapt admiration. Downstairs he stood
before the blackboard watching the quotations,
and he recognized Peter's hand. But would he
win ?

The market, like a thing fatally hurt, had been
weakly fluttering up, only to meet harder blows and
to sink more definitely. Upstairs it was a death-
struggle. The wheat-pit was so packed that the
human atoms in it became welded. The mass
swayed and writhed in one complex motion along
each of the four sides. Its voice was an inarticulate
shriek.

The big bell tolled out the stroke of one. The
hollow note booming over the great hall called the
pit to its final effort. The shriek grew more
violent. The flutterings grew less. The price be-
gan to sink steadily, ominously, point by point, like
the going out of a life.

A DAY IN WHEAT

Arthur exhaled a long sigh. He looked around
at Miss Thatcher. His manner was not excited,
not constrained.

" It can't last," he said, with a kind of com-
passionate solemnity, as though in fact they were
watching the going out of a life.

" No ? " she breathed.

In the last two minutes an overpowering sugges-
tion had been gathering in her mind : Arthur's first
reluctance, Peter Gund's worried appearance down
there, — they might be involved in this catastrophe
which she felt to be hurrying on below.

It was overwhelmingly shocking. Still, there
was a kind of desperate perverseness, — a reckless
desire to make it up to him a little.

" Will it do any harm if we stay — now ? " she
asked meekly.

He smiled readily enough. " Not at all. Stay,"
he said.

Abruptly the noise below took a new direction.
There was a pouring of the human atoms toward a
bulletin-board in the farther corner, where a man
had tacked a placard. The wheat-pit died down as
though it had been turned off. A word was shouted
along, passed on. In an instant the din in the
pit recommenced furiously. Arthur bent over,
listening. A man below flung out an arm toward
some one, and shouted, " Judson ! "

Arthur stood up. Instinctively Miss Thatcher
arose. They faced each other. Dora, a little

A DAY IN WHEAT

farther along, glanced up at them ; but neither of
them minded that.

" A failure ? '* she asked softly.

" Yes," he said gravely, looking into her face ;
" it amounts to that. It 's Judson." She did not
know who Judson was, but she knew the look on
his face. "It's the end," he said.

Her chin was lifted a little as she looked at
him, showing the soft line of her throat.

" Shall we go ? " she asked.

Her compassion enfolded him. They were very
close together. There was another word to say.
Both of them half understood that. In a way the
storm engulfed them ; but they were strangely at
home in it.

" Yes ; I want you to come with me, — you and
Dora," he began.

The bell tolled its last warning. Some people
farther on in the gallery were getting up. The
frenzy below continued. Margaret did not under-
stand — except that he wished her to be with him.
She had the sense of a trial and of loyalty. The
three went down the stairs together.

The final strokes of the bell, announcing the
closing of the market, echoed through the lower
floor of the building ; and Peter Gund, turning
from the blackboard in his office, saw Thatcher's
coachman outside, leaning from the box as some
one on the sidewalk spoke up to him. Peter turned
confidentially to Randall.

A DAY IN WHEAT

" They 're mighty well busted, Jim, all three of
'em," he said cheerfully. " There '11 be assign-
ments this afternoon. Thatcher owes us something
in six figures; but we'll cover this wheat I've
been selling, and come out well ahead. I 'm going
to lunch now. Suppose I '11 be called to the confab
by and by."

As he stepped out on the flagging, he saw the
victoria driving away empty. " Thatcher won't
need his drab livery ; he '11 want dark blue," he
thought. For just then the stir of the ended
battle was in his nerves, the lust of his victory was
in his blood. The gibe was his satisfyingly brutal
kick at the corpse. It was not so much that he
had saved the house from a large loss. The house
could stand a loss, if it came to that. But he had
won ; he had brought the concern through a strait
where few pilots would have availed.

It was three o'clock when Arthur hurried back
to the office. Peter was on his way to the con-
fab upstairs. He stopped, midway to the door,
a cigar in his mouth. Arthur crossed to him
hurriedly.

" How did — things come out ? " he asked
hastily.

Peter examined the open, anxious face with in-
dulgent cynicism.

" Well, three things have n't come out at all,"
he said. "Their names are Franklin Thatcher,
Pat Sheahan, and E. G. Tomlins."

6o'

A DAY IN WHEAT

Arthur took ofF his straw hat with a nervous
motion, and turned it over thoughtfully by the brim.
" Is it really so bad as that — for Thatcher ? " he
asked.

" Busted to the devil and gone. I 'm going up
to the funeral now." Peter watched for the effect
of his words.

Arthur shifted his weight to the other foot. For
a moment his hand fumbled aimlessly for his coat
pocket. Then he came up squarely to his father's
eye.

" See here, father," he said steadily. " I 've been
out of the office most of the day. I 've been with
Margaret Thatcher. I took her and Dora to lunch,
and — " He was going on very steadily, but just
what else was there to say ? Just what had happened ?
A great deal, of course, as he understood it ; but
what was there in an instant's surreptitious contact
of the hands, a murmured word, that he could
resolve definitely into words for his father ? " If
we can do anything to help Thatcher out, father,
I'd hke it," he added.

After all, it was as clear an explanation as Peter
desired. For him the fact lay not so much in what
concerned the girl as in Arthur's self-assertion.
Hitherto he had been only the tractable pupil, and
the habit of that relationship was so strong that it
came to Peter's lips to say sarcastically : " Certainly;
pitch right in ; do whatever you feel like for him."
As it was, he grinned a bit ; but his face quickly

A DAY IN WHEAT

sobered to his son's steady gaze. He understood in
that moment that there was a " we " ; the boy asked
to be taken into account. Peter was not displeased.
"Well," he said non-committally, and walked
away.

Upstairs in Sheahan's office he found what he
had expected, — a half-dozen men with the catas-
trophe on their hands. Some of the stress, the
highly wrought nervous energy, evoked by the big
speculation, was carried over into this conference to
decide upon the disposition of the debris. A stranger
might have said that Sheahan took it hardest. The
burly, black-bearded Irishman was plainly suffering.
He said little, was very tractable ; and every
minute, when somebody else talked, he screwed up
his face, nearly shutting his eyes, like a man who is
trying to hear something amid confusion and phys-
ical distress. But Gund comprehended the letting
off of the tremendous head of steam which Sheahan
had been carrying. He knew that Sheahan was
realizing the situation fully and would recover
quickest. Chubby little Tomlins seemed quite gay.
He made jokes — and smelled of liquor. Peter's
weary eye measured him and Peter amiably re-
flected : " He '11 be drunk to-night, and to-morrow
— whew!" Thatcher was vacuously composed.
" It will come to him day after to-morrow," Gund
thought.

He left the room with Thatcher at five o'clock.
The client slipped his hand through the Httle

A DAY IN WHEAT

broker's arm. Gund was a comfort to him to a
degree which he did not try to understand.

" Well, Peter, I owe you something handsome,"
he said in a gossiping way.

" Yes," said Gund, thinking of something else.

" I shall pay it all in time," Thatcher persisted,
with a poor bolstering of his pride.

Gund gave his head an impatient jerk. "We'll
take that up some other time ; it does n't matter,"
he said. " Now, that jag of cash wheat at Du-
luth — " he gave some practical advice.

" That 's true," said Thatcher as to the advice.
" But that don't matter much now, either. It 's all
gone." He made a large, loose gesture.

He added : " I suppose there '11 be talk enough
when I — errmm — make my assignment." He
laid the hot iron to his flesh with a certain morbid
interest.

" You need n't assign," said Gund, promptly.

Thatcher looked at him dumbly.

" Nearly all you owe, you owe to me. I 'm
going to fix up the rest. Rather have it all in my
own hands. Rather not have you assign — under-
stand ? I intend to keep your name out of it." In
his charity, Peter felt uncomfortable, nervous, on
the defensive. It helped him a little to add : " I 'm
looking at it from the standpoint of the chief
creditor. It makes my claim better — understand ? "

" Well, really, Peter — " After all, for a mo-
ment only commonplaces came to Thatcher's mind.

A DAY IN WHEAT

Yet it was a great reprieve. It meant that he could
take his failure and bankruptcy off in a corner by
himself. He was not to be publicly pilloried. It
was so great a relief that finally he said weakly, al-
most tremulously : " It 's very good of you, Peter.'*

Gund had to defend himself against that. He
said brusquely : " Oh, the devil ! it ain't anything.
No use your assigning. You have n't got anything
left to assign that 's worth mentioning."

That wholesomely braced Thatcher up a little.
" No ; that 's so," he admitted. " Still, I 'm glad
not to get into the newspapers. I 'm sorry about
the girl's money," he added, as though that in-
cidental regret were left.

« That was unlucky," Peter admitted candidly.
" But it happens. I reckon she won't suffer any.
I suppose she '11 marry well, in time." He might
have said that without thinking of Arthur, but it
happened that he did think of him.

" Well, I 've sometimes thought that she fancied
your son," said Thatcher. The words came natu-
rally out of his attitude toward Gund. He spoke
them quite shamelessly. He did not know exactly
that he was leaning upon Peter ; but he had a
weakly wounded and nervous comfort in keeping a
fast hold upon this stanch, enduring little man.
" And I don't know but Arthur — " He broke off,
smiling like an old man over an indifferent joke.

" Well, I rather guess he does," said Gund,
promptly. " Of course, if it happens that way, so

A DAY IN WHEAT

much the better. We Ve known each other a long
time." He really felt sorry for Thatcher, not so
much because he had lost his money as because he
had turned so wofully flabby.

" That *s so," said Thatcher, still with a comfort
in the subject. " Of course I once expected to
give her a different sort of send-off — and in
time — "

"Pooh! Guess I can scratch up enough to set
the youngsters going respectably, if it comes to
that," said Gund.

A real emotion stirred in Thatcher. "You're a
good fellow, Peter," he said, with futile gratitude.

Gund smiled a little grimly. " Well, I *m a
pretty good trader," he said. " I know my way
around in a wheat deal."

In the office Randall and Arthur were waiting.
Gund beckoned to the partner in a way that ex-
cluded the son.

" Have they laid down ? " the partner asked at
once.

" Gone all to pot, — flat broke," said Gund.

The bare office, with its rows of chairs whence
patrons watched the blackboards, was quite empty.
The floor, like a deserted battlefield, was littered
over with the debris of the day's trading. A silent
workman in a blue blouse was sweeping it with a
big broom, and putting the chairs to rights.

Gund dropped in one of the chairs and lighted
a fresh cigar. He was tired, but content.
5 65

A DAY IN WHEAT

" Thatcher 's gone to pieces," he repeated, with
a discursive and philosophic interest, now that
the strain was over.

" Must grind him — the assignment and all that,"
Randall suggested.

" He won't assign." Gund philosaphlzed a mo-
ment in silence. " It 's sort of queer," he said,
with a purely philosophic interest. " I suppose I
did as much as any one man to break him, and now
I 'm going to help him out. This morning, over
there," — he pointed to the den in the corner, — "I
advised him to unload on Sheahan and Tomlins.
He could 'a' done it, and saved a lot. But his
nerve failed him ; he was n't equal to it. The min-
ute I saw his nerve was gone, I knew the game was
up — and I unloaded on him. Then what do you
suppose he did ? " Gund looked up at his partner
with a deep relish for the fulfilment of his theories.
" It 's exactly what I always said : When a man's
nerve is gone, look out for him. Why, Thatcher
went out and robbed his daughter. The girl had
one hundred and twenty thousand dollars left by her
mother, — stocks and bonds, I suppose, — and he
took it. It 's always the fellow whose nerve is gone
that does those things. A bold man don't do 'em.
Thunder, no ! He goes out in the open and robs
strangers. That was the money that braced the
market about noon. Of course we were short a
big hne then. You see, I 'd advised Thatcher to
unload on the others, and it seems to me a bright,

A DAY IN WHEAT

nervy sort of man would have suspected that I 'd be
unloading on him. But what do you suppose
Thatcher does ? " Again Gund cherished his point
for a moment. " Why, soon 's he sees me, he
toddles right up and tells me what he 's done, —
taken the girl's money and so forth. Had n't nerve
enough to keep it to himself and play it through
alone — understand ? Must come and tell me, and
play right into my hands. Well, I just went up-
stairs and sold him that hundred and twenty thou-
sand dollars' worth, and some more, too."

The broker smoked a moment, and even smiled
a little, in pure fondness for the accuracy of his
judgment.

" ' Scrupulous,' I suppose they 'd call it," he said,
after a moment, retrospectively. " Well, when a
man gets ' scrupulous ' in a wheat deal, he 'd best
go throw his money in the river. It ain't that sort
of a game."

He was aware that his son had moved around
to the door, and now stood looking out, waiting.
Peter's eyes were fixed discursively on the younger
figure as he went on :

" This wheat speculation is the fastest race they 've
got up yet, and a handicapped man can't win in it.
The faster the race is, the less you can stand a
handicap ; and scruples are a handicap. A man
with scruples wants to stick to the cash wheat trade,
or something else slow and easy. But if he comes
in here, blast him ! let him play the game to win. I

A DAY IN WHEAT

guess the boy '11 stick to the cash trade, and I don't
know but the second generation ought to. If we
make money enough for 'em they can afford to wear
gloves, — stick to principles and pink teas." He
got up abruptly. " So I 'm going to step in and
help Thatcher out," he added, leaving Randall to
guess the connection, or miss it, as he might.

He crossed the office, and laid a hand on his son's
arm.

" Ready to go home ? " he asked briskly.

For answer Arthur opened the door ; but on the
flagging he paused.

"How does it come out ? " he asked.

" Well, Thatcher 's lost all his money," said
Peter ; " but he won't have to assign or to come
into the newspapers. We save him his name."
There was a slight movement of the puffy eyehds on
the plural pronoun.

" You, father ! " Arthur cried triumphantly. " It
was fine. It was like you."

The young man's praise struck a harsh note in
Peter's breast. For an instant he looked hardily at
his son, and it flashed upon him to tell this tri-
umphing young gentleman just what was " like " his
father — to explain precisely what had happened that
day. And this impulse was a belief in his own
day as against the coming day, which called itself
finer.

" Kid gloves don't do it all, young man," he said.
" What good are they, unless somebody has had the

A DAY IN WHEAT

bare, strong hand to grab things and to hold on to
them ? "

But, after all, that was impracticable ; let the
second generation be as fine as it liked. " You can
remember," he added, " that your father knew his
way around in a wheat deal, if he did n't make much
of a fist in society." He wished to forestall the pro-
test which he saw coming, and he went on hastily :
" It 's up to you, now — up to the kid glove. See
if you can do as much for the girl as we did for the
father. I fancy she '11 need it. You 're going up
to their house to that Frenchman's lecture business
to-night ? "

" Why, yes — if Thatcher is n't going to assign.
But, then, of course she won't know about it ;
there 's no need of his telling her." Arthur spoke
with a certain nervous hopefulness.

"Isn't there need?" said Peter, derisively.
" You depend on Thatcher for doing the useless
thing. He 's gone to pot. You go up there and see."

Arthur found the suggestion startling enough ;
but he labored to put it aside. Of course Thatcher
would n't tell her at once, he said ; perhaps not at
all. If he should tell her, he could see that some
cherished things that had happened that day might
be quite expunged. He relied on Thatcher's pride,
on his natural reluctance ; but as he got out of the
cab in front of the high-gabled Roman brick front
on the Lake Shore Drive, his heart beat up dis-
quietingly.

A DAY IN WHEAT

He did not see Thatcher. Presently he under-
stood an excuse, — a sudden indisposition, from
which he could draw no augury. He got one
full look at Margaret — very splendid in evening
toilet. That was reassuring, for she seemed her-
self. Then he avoided her eye, until it came to
him that she also was avoiding him, and that was
disquieting.

Presently the lecturer stopped, amid applause.
The room at once broke into multitudinous action,
from which Arthur stood apart in a kind of painful
incapacity, a tumult in his mind. He saw Mar-
garet twice, and looked away at once. The people
were going.

Again his anxious eye met hers, and he looked
away. But she came directly over to him, where he
stood aside. The action touched him, but it gave
him no certainty.

" You 're getting a wide range of knowledge to-
day," he began.

"Yes," she said. She looked steadily into his
eyes. " I Ve just had my second lesson in wheat,
too. Papa told me."

" Oh ! " He gave his head a jerk aside, of pro-
test, of regret.

" I had to know sometime; it was best to know
now," she said, still looking at him, and with a little
melancholy smile. She had proposed, as a duty, to
make him understand the difference as soon as might

A DAY IN WHEAT

be, — the great change in their positions since the
afternoon. The change, to her understanding, was
an elemental one, altering everything, unmaking
everything. This was exactly as he had feared that
it might be.

Yet just at that moment, as she stood before him,
knowing everything, and warning him that she
knew, it did not seem to him that the conditions of
their relationship had been altered in the least. In
the shock of the disclosure her loveliness and his sym-
pathy were all that he understood ; so that at once,
as though they were back in that electric moment in
the gallery, he said :

" It 's too bad, Margaret, dear ; I wanted you not
to know. But of course it doesn't make any differ-
ence to us, does it ?" he pleaded.

And at once it was as though she were back in
the moment when she had felt so profound a compas-
sion for him. He seemed to ask her compassion now
as much as then, although it was her father who had
failed, not his.

" No," she said ; " it does n't make any difference
to us." She stood before him an instant, looking
down, a picture of loyalty and surrender.

It was perfect, — only they were in plain view of
half a hundred people, and he could do nothing but
fetch a sigh. The sigh seemed at once to put them
into relationship with conventional things. Margaret
even laughed a little. They turned towards the
guests.

A DAY IN WHEAT

" Then I don't see why it was n't the best day
that ever happened — all around — for me!" he
said triumphantly.

" If you '11 always think so ! " she said.

They gave an irresponsible little laugh together,
and walked down the room side by side, looking
anything but downcast. Arthur was thinking, or
his brains were humming, in irresponsible gladness :
" After all, a wheat deal more or less — what does
it matter ? "

Ill

THE PLANT
AT HIGH GRO F E

Ill

THE PLANr
AT HIGH GROVE

THE three men kept apart in the Pullman
car on the way home from Chicago.
Dyer had gone ahead to the smoking
compartment, which he had to himself.
Maiden sat at the end 6f the car, his light overcoat
crumpled about his stout person. In his agitation
he had forgotten to take off his stiff black hat.
There was a wing of iron-gray whiskers on each
ruddy cheek, but the lips and chin were clean-
shaven. He had a way of compressing his lips
now and then, the lower one slightly protruding.
His blue eyes, aging, already somewhat dim, were
set to the window in an uncomprehending stare.

Johnson, the Superintendent of the plough works,
sat halfway down the car, his round, solid head
showing above the high back of the seat. His
clothes hung loose and ill-fitting on his great bony
frame. The big jaw and chin, projected on an
heroic scale, looked all the more salient from the

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

leanness of his face. His hands lay in his lap.
One thumb had been broken, a forefinger blunted
and twisted. A girl sat across the car, — a slim,
graceful little creature in a red jacket, — with brown
eyes, hardly more than a schoolgirl, admirably pretty.
Now and then she looked over at Johnson calmly.
If she met his round gray eye, her own soft eyes
did not instantly fall, she did not color and stir in
her seat and move her head as she had done when
her glance encountered Dyer's. Nobody knew
better than the Superintendent that to this pretty
romance-haunted girl he belonged in an order of
things world-wide from that in which she placed
Dyer.

Twilight gathered as they approached High Grove.
While the train was still some miles away, on the
other side of the river, they could see the living
fire ball of the forge chimney, a giant's torch, a
ruddy, earthy star. As they rushed nearer, the long,
low mass of the plow factory took shape on the
opposite side of the river, a stretch of rough brick
wall pierced with numberless windows. On the
very brink of the bank stood the squat smithy, of
limestone, with an iron roof from the centre of
which protruded a short iron chimney of large diam-
eter. The forge beneath sent up its flames, which
burned from the top of the chimney in a protean
crown of ever-varying fiery hues. The numberless
blank windows of the factory mirrored this fire
crown, and its inverted image, waving, leaping,

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

forever changing and renewing itself, burned in the
water below. This was the frontispiece of the
town. Beyond lay the business district, mostly
comprised in the brick-paved town square, in the
centre of which stood the soldiers' monument, —
a pedestal bearing the inevitable sculptured volun-
teer with his musket at ground-arms.

The neat little railroad station of pressed brick
had a festal effect, with its rows of incandescent
lamps and its bustle of people, as the train drew
up. The station lights shone upon the tender
green of young oak leaves, a fringe of that vast
mantle of foliage which embowered the town. A
score of townsfolk stood on the station platform.
Young Genslow, the dubious new editor of the semi-
weekly " Messenger," was talking with two girls.
One was the plump and snub-nosed Miss Presley.
The other was Johnson's sister Lena, a girl of
eighteen. She had his yellowish hair, but of a
richer tone; his gray eyes made soft and lustrous,
translated to the feminine ; a beautiful clear pink-
and-white complexion ; a graceful young figure.
Young Genslow was laughing as he spoke to her,
his white teeth showing under his little boyish curly
red moustache.

A cart stood in the shadows back of the station,
a man, not in livery, dutifully holding the horses'
heads. Miss Maiden was coming forward out of
the shadows to meet her father.

The cheeky young editor, who was said to have

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

been a Chicago newspaper reporter for a few months
before he alighted in High Grove, reached the
manufacturer first.

" Are the Maiden works going into the trust, Mr.
Maiden ? " he asked ofF-hand, smiling, confident.

All the townsfolk within hearing paused to listen,
open-mouthed over the audacity, shocked and deeply-
curious over the scandal of this beggarly cub of a
country editor halting Mr. Maiden in public and
asking him about his business.

Miss Maiden stood apart from her father and the
interviewer, yet well within the focus of all those
curious eyes.

She wore a simple summer costume. Jennie
Presley's hat far outmatched hers in size and orna-
ments. But there was that in Miss Maiden's pose
which put down the other figures in the picture.
Her large dark eyes gave one serene glance at the
cheeky young editor, from the advantage of a height
rather greater than his own, then turned calmly away
to the foliage.

Johnson, some distance up the platform, watched
her steadily. Again he felt her something carefully
finished, a creature highly evolved, predicating long
preparations, a product to the making of which there
had gone an infinitude of toil, to which, unwittingly,
many hands and minds had labored in the impene-
trable past. He knew that she was aware of himself
and of Lena. He knew, too, that she was not going
to give a sign of it.

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

Genslow was setting forth High Grove's interest in
the future of the works ; the " Messenger's " willing-
ness to give it the first official information. Maiden,
his brows puckered forbiddingly, was glowering down
upon the unwelcome questioner.

" The Maiden works have not been sold to a
trust or to anybody else ! " he broke forth angrily.
" And they 're not going to be sold ! " he added,
exasperated beyond patience. He brushed by the
editor, turning to his daughter.

Miss Maiden turned with him, still with that
calm air of expunging the scene. Johnson watched
them climb into the cart and drive away.

Beyond the square the ground rose under its un-
broken mantle of foliage. Here and there an
electric street lamp twinkled gayly through the
leaves. Lighted windows in the comfortable dwell-
ings, set spaciously apart, glowed cosily in the dark.
There was a broad air of prosperous content, and
Maiden was conscious of this amid the stress of his
thoughts, as his daughter drove on, in silence, toward
home.

" You decided not to sell, then ? " said Miss
Maiden, finally.

Although he had stubbornly kept silent, his agita-
tion pressed for utterance. At her question he burst
out wrathfully : " The trust fellows proposed to buy
this plant from us and then shut it down, dismantle
it, throw it into the river — and High Grove with
it ! They had the cost sheets all spread out. They

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

had gone over them with a microscope. They can
make plows cheaper at Illinois City. I could have
told them that before. As though I had n't found
it out during these last two years of cut-throat com-
petition. My father founded these plow works
when there was n't any town here, — only his little
blacksmith shop and half a dozen houses."

In his agitation Maiden went at once to that
aspect of the matter which appealed most strongly
to him, leaving her to guess the connection.

" The works and the town grew up together. I
have spent most of my life here. It 's a good
town, Julia ; a good town. And good works ! My
workmen have always been decently treated, —
treated like fellow-beings. They have felt secure
in their places here. I have worked all my life to
get them to buy their homes, to attach themselves
to the works and the town. I believe I have done
something here ! I have given where I could, —
not merely money, but thought, intelligence, if I
have any intelligence. Your mother and your-
self have given. There 's the library and gymna-
sium, the scholarship prizes in the public school.
There's your Art and Crafts society — and other
things. I mean we 've tried to make a community
here, — a real community, all bound up together. I
think I 've had some influence in this town, aside
from among the workmen. It's improved, — a
little city. And it all depends on the works. I
don't want to brag ; but I 've done something ! "

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

He turned his agitated face to her for approval.
*•' Yes, father, I know you have," she assented
quickly. Perhaps she understood even better than
Maiden that ideal of himself v^^hich he cherished, —
something half feudal, half scientific ; the leading
man of his community ; the shepherd of his people ;
the wise and liberal employer ; the rich man with a
heart and conscience ; the foremost light ; the tem-
poral human Providence, scattering benefits.

" I don't believe in trusts," he went on ; " never
did. The competition these last two years has been
fierce. Those fellows at Illinois City want all the
trade on any terms. Arthur's father came into the
works later, by advancing the money for the exten-
sions. Arthur himself has been a great deal away
from High Grove, — at college, abroad, anywhere
but at home. I want to be fair to him. He
does n't feel it as I do. High Grove is nothing to
him. I let him persuade me to go to Chicago and
talk it over with these men who are getting up the
trust. Blair offered us ;^400,ooo for the works,
in cash or in stock of the trust, just as we liked.
Then it came out that they proposed to abandon the
works, to transfer the business to Illinois City,
where coal is cheaper and where there's an advan-
tage in shipping. I have to say that Blair was de-
lightfully candid about it. He said the trust wanted
the Maiden works on account of the name, for
the Maiden plows are well known. Besides, they
wanted to assure the Wall Street men, the under-
6 8i

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

writers, that all danger of competition had been
eliminated. That 's the main idea. They want to
stop competition. So the ;^400,ooo was ready.
Blair seemed to have it among the small change in
his vest pocket. But as for running the plant after
they 'd bought it, that was n't to be thought of.
Blair came back to the cost sheets. They could
make plows eight per cent cheaper at Illinois City,
and to his mind that was enough reason for simply
cancelling High Grove, blotting it out of existence,
expunging it. Four hundred workmen and their
families ; a whole town ; a good community — tush !
Blair simply put that in the waste-paper basket ! "

The figure and the manner of Blair, the chief pro-
moter, kept recurring to the manufacturer's troubled
thoughts, — a large, bland person of unfailing good
humor, calmly juggling with millions, speaking of
;^400,ooo as though it were small change, listening
to Maiden's objections, then urbanely coming back
to the cost sheets as though they settled everything.
To the manufacturer this large, bland, good-humored
figure had a strangely disturbing effect, as though it
calmly alleged an irresistible power, a force of nature
against which he might struggle in vain.

" But if they can make plows cheaper at Illinois
City, father, won't the plows get made there finally,
after all ? " Miss Maiden asked suddenly.

Maiden looked at her, surprised, wounded, touched
on the sorest spot. "You've been talking with
Arthur Dyer ! " he declared accusingly.

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

"No ! '* she answered quickly, and colored slightly
in the dark.

He continued to look at her accusingly, — his own
daughter taking sides against him; siding with Dyer
and Blair and those who alleged the inevitable power
of the cost sheets.

" It merely occurred to me," she added.

They were turning into the gravel roadway which
led along the side of the ample grounds. The house,
a large square brick structure of some dignity, with
a deep veranda, was set in large grounds which oc-
cupied the crest of the hill. The town spread
beneath them.

"What does WilHam think ? ** Miss Maiden ven-
tured as the horses slowed to a walk.

" Ah, William ! " Maiden instantly lightened up,
as he caught at this one point of cheer. "Johnson
understands it. He's a workman himself! You
should have seen his eye brighten and his jaw
settle when I told him we were not going to sell !
Yes, Johnson understands it. He knows what it
means to the workmen and to the town. Whatever
Arthur Dyer — and you — may think, I know
there 's something in High Grove worth saving. I
know eight per cent in the cost does n't cover the
whole case. It 's the community, the well-being of
four hundred men and their wives and children, —
yes, of a thousand men. What ! After I 've
worked all my life to make this what it is, to hand
it over to the trust for destruction ? Not much !

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

I 'd be a pretty leader to lead my people into that
pit, would n't I ? No, no, Julia, High Grove is
worth saving. Of course I don't blame Arthur so
much," he added more quietly, as the horses stopped ;
" he does n*t feel it as I do. I wish I had the money
to buy out his share of the works. Then I 'd fight
it out alone — with Johnson." Preparing to ahght,
he seemed to remember something. " Why did n't
you go over and speak to William ? " he asked.

"Did he wait? I didn't notice," said Miss
Maiden.

Leaving the station, Johnson turned homeward.
His house stood at the beginning of the reach of
level land near the river, beyond the works. Per-
sons living on the hill called this the flat. Shade
was not so abundant here. Farther on, some rows
of plain, frail little boxes of houses with no shade at
all stood close together, the doorsteps flush with the
board sidewalks. Johnson's house was of frame,
a story and a half with a small L, plain but comfort-
able, in a neat yard inclosed by a picket fence.

His mother still did the housework, with inciden-
tal help from Lena. She was a woman of ample
frame, with a broad plain face and thin iron-gray
hair. This evening she wore the usual loose calico
wrapper which made her bulk look so shapeless. Go-
ing and coming between kitchen and dining-room

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

as she served Johnson his late supper, she saw, in
spite of his abstraction, that he was in high spirits.

" So Mr. Maiden won't sell the works ? " she said
presently.

" No. He '11 not let the plant be shut down.
We '11 fight ! " he affirmed with a grim relish.

" Well, fightin' a trust takes a long pocket-book,"
she observed.

" Yes," he assented absently, his mind already
busy planning for the new condition ; " and close
economy all around. Hard work for me, mother !
A good many corners must be cut off. Perhaps it
will involve lower wages for a while."

She paused, coffee-pot in hand, and pondered the
point in her slow way. " Well, I s'pose so," she
said. "I s'pose whether they sell to the trust or
don't sell, the men 's pretty sure to get the worst of
it, anyhow." She delivered this bit of philosophy in
her mild, good-humored voice, stopping to laugh in
a kind of exaggerated purring which shook her am-
ple sides and made little noise. It was said without
rancor, — a simple, good-natured expression of the
point of view at which she had arrived through the
long struggle against poverty during her husband's
lifetime, and in which she had been confirmed through
the companionship of other people struggling against
poverty.

Johnson glanced up at her with a touch of sur-
prise. Long ago he had perfectly comprehended
his mother, — slow-witted, of the most commonplace

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

and circumscribed mind, incapable of mental expan-
sion, clinging with invincible stubbornness to cer-
tain rudely traditional things, yet, along with this
invincible stubbornness, of so lax a fibre that even
Lena's rashness did not deeply trouble her; affec-
tionate, instantly ready to give her life for those she
loved, but utterly incompetent to manage her own
daughter, her flabby will absolutely helpless under
the bright, alert will of the headstrong girl. Long
ago Johnson knew all this. Long ago he had
thoroughly comprehended her rudimentary idea of
society, which consisted in the good-natured belief
that the poor always got the worst of it. Now
his eye took in her bulky figure in the loose calico
wrapper, her broad, red, hard hand upon the coffee-
pot, her plain, flat face, wrinkled, its age almost
pathetically accentuated by the glaringly white false
teeth. It came to him abruptly that this figure of
toil was also a result of long evolution, predicating
conditions through an impenetrable past. With an
unpremeditated action he reached out and took her
free hand. There was something like a lump at
the base of his throat as he smiled up at her. An
abrupt passion of loyalty to her, not only as his
mother, but as the figure of toil, moved his heart.
His emotion affirmed the truth of her rudimentary
philosophy, which his head disdained.

" They don't often get the best of it — in the
long run, mother," he assented. There was the
old contrition in his assent. A sharp point of

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

remorse pricked his brain with the accusation that
his mother certainly had scarcely got the best
of it.

They heard the front door open. Johnson
dropped his mother's hand with a self-conscious
suspense. Lena came in, a package in her hand.
There was a sort of helpless waiting and question-
ing in the way the mother and brother watched the
girl as she crossed the room briskly and began
untying her package at the sideboard. The quick,
graceful movements of her body and hands showed
her supple, nervous young energy. The sideboard
mirror reflected the beautiful, delicate coloring of
her skin and the rich tone of her soft, abundant
hair. As she glanced down at the package, the
long lashes veiling her lustrous eyes, she looked a
dash of splendid color on a dull background, a note
of passion, an anxiety.

" Well, I guess Mr. Maiden means well by his
men,'' said the mother, disengaging herself first
from that suspense which Lena's entrance had
evoked.

" No man means better ; no man means better,"
the Superintendent declared heartily.

The girl looked over her shoulder with one of
her quick movements. " Such lovely houses as he
gives some of 'em, — nice little shanties stuck in
the mud," she observed.

She saw her brother's eye harden, and she met his
steady, almost hostile, look boldly.

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

" Oh, I know about the library and the scholar-
ship prizes and all that," she declared. " I know
those Maidens. They like to show us ofF and
look pious when people praise them for taking
such interest in us. You ought to have been at
the Arts and Crafts business yesterday when Miss
Maiden had her two swell friends out from Chicago.
One of 'em said : ' But, my dear Julia, how do you
ever have the patience to teach all this ? ' Then
she saw Jennie Presley and me standing by, and she
said : ' Of course the young ladies must be very
clever.' Jennie Presley's father is a merchant.
He 's got plenty of money, and I hope we 're not
tramps. But that woman, with her air, might
as well have said: 'What an interesting lot of
monkeys you 're training ! ' That 's what we are
to Julia Maiden at bottom. She's real proud of
us when we do the tricks without making a mis-
take. Did you see her look over my head at the
station to-night ? It would n't have hurt her to
bow to me, I guess. If she 'd whistled and held
up a bun I might have stood on my head right
there. Jen Presley says we must n't blame the
poor girl, because, with all her charity patients,
she can't always remember which are the Arts
and Crafts and which the free soup and second-
hand clothes."

A slow, dull ruddy glow came up under John-
son's tanned skin. " Was it Jennie Presley — or
Genslow that said that ? " he asked in a hard voice.

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

In an instant he regretted it. He was always
failing with Lena. His very anxiety betrayed
him into stupid exasperation over her incorrigible
wilfulness.

The girl flushed. The hurt showed in her eyes ;
but they did not falter before his steady look. She
stooped a little toward him.

" Does it hurt you to have somebody pay me
some attention, William ? " she asked. Her voice,
sweet as a child's, had the note of a hurt child.

Johnson's eyes fell. He was ashamed. She
was so adorably pretty. When her sweetness
defended her wilfulness he was utterly at a loss,
like a man set to correct an instrument at once
too strong and too delicate for his hands.

The girl passed slowly from the room. They
heard the front door close behind her. Johnson
drank his cofFee in troubled silence. Mrs. Johnson
sat down at the table, pushing her spectacles up on
her wrinkled forehead.

" I know how you feel about it, William," she
began mildly; "but sometimes lately I wonder
whether you done right, — keeping yourself as much
like a workman as you could, I mean after you
got able to live better. When I think of Lena,
I guess it ain't been very good for her. If we 'd
lived different, in a finer house, in the best way you
could afFord, maybe it 'd 'a' been better for her.
Maybe she 'd 'a' been content to keep on at school
like you wanted her to."

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

Johnson scarcely dared look at her for an instant,
and he quailed inwardly as though she had brought
up his most deeply hidden secret and exhibited it
before his eyes.

" It would have been better. I believe it would
have been better," he said.

" Seems like you could n't do very much good to
other people this way, anyhow. Course I know
how you feel about it," the mother hastened to
add.

" No, you don't know, mother," said the son.
" I have some influence with the men at the works,
but it 's just because they know I 'm fair with
them, not because I live like a workman. I 'm
the boss there. You can't get over that. That 's
the fact that fixes our relationship. You can't get
over that. I 've felt that for a long time. The old
zeal is gone." The dull glow came under his
tanned skin. "Maybe it's pride that kept me on
in the way I began. Something happened" — he
looked up at her, yearning with a sudden contrite
affection toward this homely maternal figure of toil.
" There was a love affair which fixed everything.
I've never been able to change it. Pride, perhaps,
prevented me. And you and Lena — you've had
the worst of it. I have n't been good to you."

The suggestion of an old love affair scarcely stirred
her imagination. Naturally there were love affairs
in youth as there was measles earlier. This unac-
countable man-child of hers would have had a love

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

afrair, and he would never have told her. That was
most natural. What touched her was his con-
trition.

" Not me, son ! Not me," she said quickly.
"I'm as good off here as anywhere — better off
than anywhere else. I would n't be happy any other
way. Lena — she 's flighty, and it might have been
better for her. But I guess it would n't have made
any difference in the long run. She 's flighty, but
a good girl, William. She goes to church every
Sunday."

Johnson smiled a little. The speech helped to
restore the accustomed relationship between them.

" Don 't trouble, son," she said soothingly.
"We're all right."

"Well — I hope so," he said, smiling at her.

" And if Mr. Maiden should sell the works and
they 'd be closed up — "

" No, no ! " he interrupted decisively. " The
works will not be closed ! " The muscles of his
big, lean, salient jaw stiffened. " They will not be
closed ! I '11 keep them going ! "

III

There was scarcely the murmur of a leaf in High
Grove's royal mantle of foliage. The air itself glit-
tered in the open with little tremulous gossamer
waves of heat. From Johnson's front yard the
stretch of river shone like burnished metal, and the

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

plow works, for all their rude glare of red brick, had
an oddly insubstantial effect, as though they were
painted against the water. On that Sunday after-
noon in August, High Grove was motionless and
voiceless.

Nevertheless, Dyer walked rapidly. He wore a
shirt-waist, white duck trousers broadly reefed at the
bottom, and he carried a wide sunshade, to the lan-
guid amusement of persons in the lower town who
were lounging in their scant door-yards as he passed.
These persons held him in unconcealed contempt as
a dude. But. Dyer's long, thin, clean-shaven face
and his rapid stride showed no infirmity of purpose.

Johnson, on his elbow in the unmown grass, which
he liked better than a trim lawn, saw the owner com-
ing, and got up as Dyer turned in at the gate. The
two men shook hands briefly and sat down on the
rustic bench under the largest oak in the yard. Dyer
went straight at the business.

" You know how it is over there." He nodded
towards the works.

Johnson knew. The trust had been in operation
sixty days. The competition was like this steady,
unrelieved glare of the August sun. The Maiden
works were losing money every day. With all their
losses the trust was taking away their trade. They
must put prices still lower and stand still greater
losses.

" I got back from Chicago yesterday," Dyer went
on rapidly. " Blair renews the original offer. He

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

will take the works for the trust at ^400,000. They
are sensible people. They want peace. Mr. Mai-
den knows the situation now. He knows that we
shall simply ruin ourselves if we keep on fighting
the trust. They can make plows cheaper than we
can. They have a longer pocket-book. For every
dollar that we lay down they can lay down five.
You know of the plan to reduce wages ten per
cent ? "

"As a matter of course."
" Suppose the men accept it ? "
" They will accept it."

"Very well," Dyer went on. "That will re-
duce the cost of production by six or seven per cent,
we will say. The trust will simply cut under us
again. We will make them lose a little more money.
In the end it 's simply their millions against our
thousands. You know that. Mr. Maiden knows
it now. But he has taken his stand on a matter of
principle. It's a point of honor with him now.
He's stuck on that point of honor, and he 's going
to ruin himself and ruin his family."

" What do you mean ? " Johnson demanded.
" Exactly this, Johnson," — he flung it out with
the air of a challenge, — " Mr. Maiden holds only
forty-eight per cent of the stock of the company in
his own name. I hold forty-six per cent. Six per
cent of the stock stands in your name. Of course
I know the arrangement between you and Mr. Mai-
den. Your stock is only a quarter paid for, and

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

Mr. Maiden looks upon it perhaps as essentially his
property until it is paid for. Even if it were fully
paid for, I have no doubt that under all the circum-
stances he would take it for granted it would be
voted, on any vital question, according to his wish.
You know Mr. Maiden. The idea of anybody in
High Grove entertaining a plan in opposition to his
plan does n't readily occur to him. The point is that
this stock was transferred to you. It stands in your
name. You have paid something on it. You have
every legal right to vote it as you please. I believe
you are clearly entitled to join with me and use the
stock for the trust. You and I together can muster
a majority against him. I don't yield you anything
in regard for Mr. Maiden. You know how I stand
there. But he 's stuck on his point of honor. Al-
though he knows that he 's ruining himself and his
family, he won't give in. I don't know why you
back him up in it. That 's your affair. In my judg-
ment, a man really devoted to him could n't do better
than save him now in spite of himself. After all,
ruining a family is a hard fact."

Johnson sat very still, his round gray eyes fixed
on the bending stretch of the river. Dyer stooped
and plucked a spear of grass. Then, gathering him-
self firmly in hand, he plunged on abruptly :

"See here, Johnson. You and I get on together
better than any other two persons in the whole muss.
We 've both got some sense — and some nerve.
We 've always stood up square-shouldered in front

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

of each other, and understood each other, without
nonsense. I don't need to say to you that I 've got
money outside of the works. If the plant fell in the
river to-morrow, I 'd still be comfortably well off.
But I won't put another cent into the works under
present conditions, and Mr. Maiden has n't anything
to speak of outside of the works. I could stand it
if the thing went by the board. He could n't. What
I mean is, that I 'm not considering any selfish in-
terests in this." He flung it out in that challenging
way.

" Oh, I understand that," said Johnson, quickly
and harshly. "I mean, I understand your motive.
I know you 're not plugging for your interests. As
you say," — his round eyes fixed the eyes of the
owner; the two men looked at each other, square-
shouldered, — " you and I have got on better than
any other two. We understand each other. I can
do this thing that you propose ; I mean I 'm capable
of doing it ; yet I am under many obligations to Mr.
Maiden. He trusts me fully. That stock which
stands in my name he regards as his for the matter
in hand. To use it against him would have all the
appearance of the most detestable betrayal. If
there 's any man in the world that I 'd hate not
being able to look squarely in the eye, that man is
Mr. Maiden. You can understand that."

" Perfectly. It would cost you something, John-
son, to turn against him and overcome him by
force. Maybe more than it would cost me. But

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

there are others. You know how much of a
service it would be to Mrs. Maiden — and Miss
Maiden."

" Does she know of this ? " Johnson demanded
abruptly.

" Naturally it 's not a thing for her to know —
this proposition," said Dyer ; " but she knows her
father's situation and the situation of the works."

Again for a moment the two men looked each
other hard in the eye. Johnson's eyes turned
slowly to the works and came back to Dyer's face.
" I am those works," he said slowly, in a low
voice, eye to eye with Dyer. " I am that plant.
I 've kept it going the last five years — not Maiden.
I am keeping it going now. I don't care a rap
for the plant either. I mean for my job and the
chance, possibly, to get in as part owner, ar\d for
the town and all that. It 's something else."

Dyer took a long breath, looking at the Superin-
tendent with open admiration. " I know you 've
kept the plant going," he said. " And I suppose I
can understand " — he bent forward and touched
the other's knee. " But don't you see, Johnson,
you can do better to wind it up now ? "

"Maybe. It might be worth while — and wind
myself up with it," said Johnson, slowly. "Let
me think it over."

He looked at the plant, then up at the shining
bend of the river; and he did not look around
as Dyer left.

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

At noon the men gathered in the wood-finishing
shop, a long room on the ground-floor of the main
building, bare save for the work-benches which ran
around three sides, fitted with various tools and
machines. The whole force came, four hundred,
comfortably filling the room. There were a score
of young women from the office and the label-room,
neatly dressed in shirt-waists and summer skirts.
The men lifted them to seats on a long high bench,
with jokes and laughter, so that here where the
girls were, there was a note of gayety, the contact
of the sexes striking out its little play of comedy
in spite of the heaviness which pervaded the room
elsewhere.

Maiden pushed his way through hurriedly, with
a hasty greeting here and there, and mounted the
chair at the farther end of the room. The Presi-
dent's large figure stood in sharp relief against the
bare rough wall of whitewashed brick. Four hun-
dred faces turned toward him in anxious silence,
waiting the word from this master of their bread.

Maiden spoke rapidly, earnestly. He recited
briefly the original offer of the trust to buy the
works, which had been rejected when it developed
that the trust proposed to shut down the plant.
The trust had been formed without them. It
intended to dominate the field. They were bear-
ing the full brunt of its competition. Doubtless
7 97

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

the men all knew that the works were being oper-
ated at a loss. The Company was willing to take
its full share of the fight. It would accept the
situation to the limit of its ability. It would forego
every cent of profit. It would even stand a round
loss. But it could not stand the whole loss with-
out ruining itself, which would be to accomplish
the purpose of the trust and wipe out the High
Grove plant. They must go on selling plows as
cheap as the trust sold if they were to hold their
trade and continue in the business. He believed
there was something in the High Grove plant
worth preserving. The men knew what High
Grove was as well as he did. Here was a com-
munity which worked out to the good of all its
members. The children had the best advantages,
were brought up in a clean, wholesome atmosphere,
had an example of applied democracy before them.
The works had never closed a day for forty years
— since his father started them. Men felt secure
in their employment. Wages were not violently
reduced in hard times. At this moment wages
averaged higher in High Grove than in the trust
plants, although there had been a slight rise —
widely advertised • — in the latter. This plant had
always been run as though the men had a right
to share in its prosperity, as though they were
partners in the enterprise. The enterprise was now
confronted with an enemy which purposed destroy-
ing it. They must stand together in common

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

danger. He proposed a horizontal reduction of
ten per cent in wages, pledging himself that the
v/ages should be restored as soon as the situation
improved, — as soon as the trust learned that here
was a community which proposed to stand up for
the good that was in it ; which could neither be
bought nor bullied into subjection to trust rule.
He would like to hear from any of the men who
had anything to say.

The President's fervent voice, wound up to an
oratorical pitch, stopped in a dramatic pause — and
a dead silence ensued. Thirty, forty heavy painful
seconds passed without a stir. Then Packett, the
foreman of the wood-finishing room, one of the
best men in the plant, slid from a bench beside his
daughter, stepped to the clear space before the
chair, and faced the audience, — a tall, spare man
of fifty with a long, limp, iron-gray moustache.

"We've heard what Mr. Maiden says," he be-
gan. " I 've been in the works twenty years. My
children were brought up here, and I believe High
Grove has been a good place for them. I 'd hate to
see the works shut down. We know that Mr.
Maiden has been fair and we can take his word. It
will be pretty hard lines for some of us ; but for
one I 'm willing to stand my cut. I think it 's the
best thing we can do."

That was all — to Maiden's secret surprise and
chagrin. There was nothing of the enthusiasm,
nothing of the ideal communal loyalty which he had

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

expected. Packett walked back to his bench.
There was a little patter of applause from the older
workmen, — the polite cheering of a comrade ; then
the oppressive silence again.

Lyman, a workman as old in the service as Packett
himself, a skilful and steady man, with thick hair and
a bushy beard, spoke from the centre of the room.

" How long will the cut last, Mr. Maiden ? "

'' As long as the trust makes it necessary," the
President replied with a touch of passion. He kept
a clear face to the audience, but he was bitterly dis-
appointed, half angry at the stolid attitude of the
men.

Lyman came forward to the spot Packett had
occupied, turning his hairy, intelligent face to the
audience.

'' I have been a long time in the works, too," he
said slowly. " I think High Grove has been a good
place for a workman. I will cheerfully stand the
cut or double the cut if that 's all we need to keep
from being turned out here ; if the plant will go on
then as it has in the past. Ten percent off a work-
man's wages means a good deal to him ; more than
a wealthy man realizes. If the trust is going to
gobble us up in the end, there *s no use in our mak-
ing sacrifices. But if Mr. Maiden says he thinks
this cut will fix him so he can hold his own against
the trust until the trust gives in, we ought to take
his judgment."

Again there was a heavy silence, the men op-

lOO

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

pressed by the prospective loss of income, which
meant a reduction in their already narrow scale of
living, — oppressed still more by uncertainty as to
the future, by lack of assurance as to whether this
sacrifice would suffice.

" I can only tell you what the situation is now,"
said the President, quietly. The oppression reached
his own heart. " One cannot see what the future
holds. In my judgment the ten per cent cut will
suffice. I have given you my best judgment. The
alternative is to close the works."

Nothing more was offered. Maiden stepped
down from the chair. The men began leaving the
room in heavy silence. When most of them were
gone. Maiden himself went out, keenly disappointed,
gloomy, chagrined because they had met him with
no more enthusiasm, feeling that someway they had
belied his faith in them, half angry with them for it
in spite of himself.

Going out, he saw Johnson by the door, talking
to a knot of men. The Superintendent's big spare
frame loomed above the others. His bent head and
lean face gave an effect of power. There were force,
conviction, authority, in the tones of his voice. The
men were nodding their heads in assent.

" Yes, that 's so, that 's so," one of them said.

It lightened the President's oppressed heart. Here
was something sure, solid, invincible, in a world which
had somehow been getting all adrift. He felt Johnson
like a rock under his struggling feet.

lOI

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

When Johnson presently went around to the
oflice, he came upon Genslow at the corner of the
building, talking with Biggs and four or five other
ironworkers, recent arrivals, men from Chicago who
had been through strikes and worked in unions.

" The old man's gufF did n't fool 'em much," he
heard Biggs say.

The Superintendent threw Genslow a hard look,
and passed without other recognition. No courtesy
was wasted between him and the editor nowadays.

In the days that followed, a new air pervaded High
Grove. Two strangers arrived from Chicago.
Soon every one knew that they were agents from
the labor organization, come to preach among the
men, seeking to form them into trades' unions. To
this time there had been only the vaguest organiza-
tion among the High Grove workmen. Now the
air of the town was full of this new force, — the
organized workmen banded to exert their power,
a power great enough to overthrow the established
order, to cause social upheavals. To the substan-
tial people in High Grove this power suggested
something huge, sinister, anarchic. But there were
others among the townsfolk who upheld the unions,
and still others — the younger and less responsible
element — who sat back and hoped there would be
a jolly good row, anyway. Genslow had the effect,

I02

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

to the more stable townsmen, of being enthusiasti-
cally of this latter element. The " Messenger" criti-
cised the Company and its President and openly
gloried in the progress of the union. There was
talk of driving the editor out of town.

Johnson watched. He could feel the drift of the
men toward the union. In the loss of part of their
wages, in the uncertainty as to the future, their
sense of helplessness drove them together. Packett
and some of the older men would have nothing to
do with the movement, abstaining from principle
and persuading others to hold away. Lyman and
another thoughtful element welcomed the movement,
likewise from principle. But circumstances, the sense
of helplessness, swayed most and drew them toward
the organization. A little while ago they were
prosperous, contented, secure. Now, from no acts
of theirs, this calamity of reduced wages had come
upon them. Harder things might be in store.
They must stand together, each lending his strength
to the others. The way to do this was to join in
the union. If they did n't like it, they could with-
draw. In two weeks a hundred men had joined,
and there was a guarded mass meeting. The men
drew courage from a sense of the strength in their
numbers. With courage and confidence the idea of
their rights increased. Biggs and his ironworkers
declared boldly that they must demand the old wages
and strike if they did n't get them. Everybody
knew that Dyer wanted to sell the works to the

103

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

trust. With the advantage of this ten per cent
reduction in expenses he could get better terms from
the trust. Then, like as not, he would persuade
Maiden to sell, and the men would be left holding
the bag. Ten per cent meant bread and butter out
of their families' mouths. Was Dyer taking any
ten per cent reduction in his living ? Was n't he
living like a nabob all the time? Why did n't he
sell some of his horses if he wanted to get money to
fight the trust — not take the money from women
and children ?

Maiden sat gloomy at the dinner-table. " The
men have a perfect right to organize, a perfect
right," he was saying to his wife, trying, not very
successfully, to give it the air of a cheerful assent.
" I can't blame them — if they think it will do them
any good. But " — he looked up in a troubled
search for" sympathy — "I think I had earned the
right to their confidence. Why, this talk of a strike
is nonsense — idiotic. That would be too absurd —
for the men to strike and close the works — the
very thing the trust would like best ! " He looked
at his wife and at Julia for affirmation. The women
were silent. " Johnson has great influence with
them, — great influence. He's one of them," he
added, with a suggestion of helplessness which
escaped neither listener.

The President's world, which had seemed so right
and strong, so immutably founded upon what was
best and most righteous, had received so many

104

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

shocks of late — since Blair, the trust-promoter, had
stepped in — that he was beginning to feel a bit con-
fused and at a loss, as though the sun persisted in
rising from the west.

"It occurs to me, Frank, that Johnson would
have done better if he had driven these agitators
away and prevented the forming of the unions,"
Mrs. Maiden observed presently.

She had that high, cracked voice, of a quality by
no means unpleasant, which comes to some nervous
women late in life. Her hair was puffed and frizzed
in front. She had worn it that way ever since Julia
could remember, with never a concession to the
mode of the day. There was a bit of fine lace at
the neck of her dress. She usually wore a bit of
fine lace. She managed to convey and to maintain
a singular suggestion of an ancient regime. Her
view of the Superintendent's duty in respect of the
union surprised neither husband nor daughter.
Maiden only smiled with a fond and admiring in-
dulgence.

" Driving people away is n't so easy, Fanny," he
said. "You have the only sceptre in town."

" All the more reason why I should keep mine,"
she replied, and in the lift of her head there was a
hint of her pride of place. " At any rate, Johnson
might drive some of the young men away from his
sister. I suppose his mother is helpless enough,"
she added.

Maiden caught an odd glance between mother

105

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

and daughter, and looked back at his wife for an
explanation.

" We have had to drop the young lady," said
Mrs. Maiden, dryly, and Maiden then compre-
hended that here was something between his wife
and daughter which the wife had been waiting for a
chance to notify him of.

"Not we, mother; you; you alone!" Miss
Maiden exclaimed. " I have nothing to do with it.
I have begged you not to do it. But my wishes
count for nothing, it seems. I 'm not pleading for
the girl. Lena is n't bad ; but she is foolish. Yet
it is n't for her; but for William's sake — "

"We are not dropping William," Mrs. Maiden
observed with a quiet, acid touch of sarcasm.

" Yes, you are ! Ask father if William has n't
carried the works on his shoulders these last five
years ! "

" I fancy your father has been about — although
you seem not to have observed it," said Mrs. Maiden,
with the quiet, acid touch.

Maiden flushed slightly. " Well, I think I have
been about the works some," he said with a heavier
attempt at sarcasm. " H'm — what's it all about,
anyway ? "

" I walked into the orchard last night about nine
o'clock," Julia began, looking at him eagerly; "I
came upon somebody at the pear-tree. After all, it
was only a silly youngsters' prank. There was
Jennie Presley and the fellow Genslow and another

1 06

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

lad — and Lena. The gallants were stealing pears
for the girls. It was a silly youngsters' prank, — a
bit of juvenile bravado. I called to Lena, but she
ran away with the others. Mamma heard me call,
and she asked me about it to-day. She is going to
drop Lena and Jennie — not invite them to the
harvest party. It is too high-handed — with me ! "

Mrs. Maiden, her gray, frizzled head erect, looked
over at her daughter. " If I do not hesitate to be
high-handed with my own child, why should I hesi-
tate with other people's children ? " she said, in her
high, cracked, not unpleasant voice. "I trust that
an invitation from Mrs. Maiden implies some-
thing," she went on with dry deliberateness. " I hope
that it implies at least passing respectability and the
degree of good manners which you might reasonably
expect from a sober hod-carrier. When it does not
imply that much, Mrs. Maiden will cease sending
invitations. I hope I am not uncharitable ; but I
believe in this case in exercising charity on behalf of
the orderly and well-disposed young women who
believe that there is some slight significance in being
invited to my house. If these affairs of ours, which
are given because they are supposed to suggest
certain standards to the poorer people, are to take
the character of public picnics where anybody and
everybody can forgather, we will stop giving the
affairs."

At the bottom of his heart Maiden was im-
mensely proud of his wife's distinction. He wished

107

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

her to be the aristocrat that she was : it saved his
democracy from becoming commonplace. There
was no moment when he was not conscious of a
difference between himself and the workmen for
whom he took so much thought.

" I should n't like to hurt Johnson's feelings," he
said in a troubled, propitiating way. " William is
doing great work for us now. It might seem —
h'm — unappreciative, unkind, you know. I wish
it could be avoided."

" Do you wish your wife to send your Superin-
tendent a list of her guests for his approval ? " asked
Mrs. Maiden.

" Oh, not that, Fanny ! Not that, of course,
only—"

" Only it would come to that. We can give the
party or not, just as you like."

" Why, certainly we will give the party. It has
been announced. Of course, this is an affair of the
house."

" And Johnson belongs to the works, not the
house," said Mrs. Maiden.

" I dare say Johnson will have the sense to under-
stand it," said Maiden, unhappily.

" I dare say," said Mrs. Maiden, in her dry way ;
and Julia knew the affair was settled.

" He's an intelligent man," said Mr. Maiden; " and
a most useful employee," he added for Julia's benefit.

Nothing further was said between mother and
daughter. The day for sending out the invitations

io8

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

came. This was Miss Maiden's task. The day
passed with the task untouched. In the evening
Miss Maiden paced restlessly across her room.
She looked anything but a weak woman. The
beauty of her full, clear-skinned, colorless face lay
in the square intelligent brow, the large dark eyes,
the mass of black hair, and the mobile mouth. In
the chin and nose there was a touch of strength
which was, perhaps, insisted upon too much. It
was not that her mother's will imposed upon her
— still less her father's. An intricate and irresistible
mass of things compelled her with its slow, stupid,
unanswerable weight. She went to the desk, took
out the bundle of invitations, neatly done up from
the stationer's, a package of envelopes, and the list of
guests. She sat back in the chair and put her hand
over her face with an unusual gesture. The hand
dropped. Her large dark eyes searched the wall a
moment, as though its blank, dead surface might
abruptly disclose a way out. Then she took a
corner of her lip between her teeth and began ad-
dressing the envelopes rapidly. When she came to
Lena Johnson's name on the list a quick blur of
tears dimmed her eyes. A drop fell on the blotter.
But she skipped the name and went on without a
pause.

Johnson sat in the front room looking over the "Mes-
senger." He did not care to be seen on the porch

109

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

with it in his hand. He knew that Mr. Maiden
had rather conspicuously banished the sheet from his
house. Yet what it had to say about Maiden affairs
found its way to the President. The paper appeared
twice a week, Thursday and Saturday afternoons.
It was the Thursday issue, still damp from the press,
which Johnson unfolded, — a blanket sheet of four
sprawling pages, ill-printed, blotchy with big type,
straggling, its dampness giving it the effect of a rag.
The second, third, and fourth pages were mostly
patent-inside and advertising. On the front page
Johnson found three items to read. The first :

" There are rumors of an approaching marriage in the very
highest social circle. This is an event to which High
Grove has been looking forward with deep interest for sev-
eral years. Dame Rumor says it is to happen this time.
The * Messenger' begs to tender the happy couple its best
compliments."

Then further down :

**The great social event of the summer, the Maidens'
harvest party, is to be given next Thursday evening. The
handsome mansion and spacious grounds on the hill will be
lavishly decorated. We are told that the party, while
given in the most recherche manner, will be on the same
broad democratic lines which have marked so many other
splendid functions on the hill, making them not mere social
affairs in the restricted sense of that term, but pubhc events
in which practically the whole town participates, thus bind-
ing our people together, two or three times a year, on a
common footing."

I lo

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

And in the middle of the page :

*' It is reported that the trust has made another cut in the
price of plows which are sold in competition with the Mai-
den works. This will be bad news for the High Grove
workmen. Meeting the trust*s competition by reducing
wages is a simple process for the Company ; but it is quite
serious for the men. The trust does not reduce wages,
because, being a wicked combination, without public sym-
pathy, it has to treat its men decently. How long the High
Grove workmen can stand it to fight the trust remains to be
seen. The Company, of course, can stand it forever under
its clever plan of reducing wages. We learn that the organ-
izing of the men is going on rapidly, and that another mass
meeting of those who have joined the unions will soon be
held.'*

Johnson turned to the last page, — that on which
the local advertisements appeared. There were only
the advertisements of Kohn, the clothing-emporium
man, of the Silver Dollar and Workmen's Ex-
change saloons, and the cards of a quack doctor
and two dubious lawyers. All the responsible con-
cerns, without whose patronage the paper could not
exist, had withdrawn from its pages in a body — and
that meant the end of the " Messenger." To get rid
of the " Messenger" was part of the fight to save the
works. In that fight Johnson was giving quarter to
nobody. He had won here. The " Messenger " was
at the end of its rope. But as the Superintendent
looked down at the blank advertising page which
told of his victory, there was no elation, no satis-
faction, in his mind.

1 1 1

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

That marriage in high life meant, of course, Dyer
and Miss Maiden. This young cub Genslow, hard-
ly of an age to vote, with his air of blundering inno-
cence, managed to say exactly what would hurt most.
Genslow's blackguarding did not matter particularly,
perhaps; and that Dyer and Miss Maiden would be
married was to be expected. Yet Johnson tossed
the paper aside and stood up, his eyes dulled and
hard. A challenge sounded in his brain. He felt
himself inscrutably called upon to muster all his
force, to strain every muscle, to grapple anew with
his contrary world. His arms ached for action, —
for something tangible and ponderable, that a man
could clutch and struggle with.

Presently he put on his hat and sauntered out the
back way, meaning to stroll across the flat and come
around by the works, — for no reason except that in
the savage struggle of his thought the works myste-
riously drew him on. He passed out of the back
gate. There was no sidewalk here, only a path in
the tall grass with a screen of currant and black-
berry bushes on the side next to the garden. Step-
ping out, Johnson came upon Genslow, who was
strolling by, his boyish face, with its gallant little
moustache, turned up toward the rear of the house ;
evidently he was looking for some one. Johnson
knew who the some one was, and before this slim,
trim young figure, gallant and debonair, with that
advantage in its air which the adventurous have,
he felt the hard belligerence of his mood concentrate

I 12

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

and take him in hand. Genslow recovered his poise
first.

" Good evening, Mr. Johnson," he said. In the
young fellow's handsome face, in his slight, tentative
smile, in his boyish brown eyes, there was a certain
softness, a tender of amity, a subtle offering to make
friends.

That tentative, proffering softness instantly re-
ferred itself to Lena in Johnson's hard, hostile, jeal-
ous mind. The girl stood between them, and the
older man, conscious of being burly and unromantic,
felt a kind of sullen joy over the rude power of his
body. His hard mood pushed him on.

" What are you doing here ? " he demanded.

Genslow hesitated a moment. Again there was
the slight, tentative smile which offered to ignore the
affront ; again that subtle offer of friendliness. But
there was no response in the Superintendent's wrath-
ful eye.

" Just walking on — the king's highway," said
the cub.

" And trying to make trouble,'* Johnson added
forbiddingly.

" Been reading the ' Messenger ' ? " The editor
smiled more brilliantly. There was the note of
gayety in his youthful voice. " But did you see
the advertising page ? The respectables have shut
me out — cut me dead ! " He laughed. " I sup-
pose you did it, too."

" I think it 's a good precedent, Genslow. I 'm
8 113

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

going to follow it. I '11 trouble you not to loiter at
my back gate. It is n't agreeable."

Genslow paused a second. "Not agreeable —
to you, you mean," he suggested softly.

A flush of deeper anger overspread Johnson's
face. He knew that he was behaving stupidly;
but the hard fighting mood pushed him on. " No
matter to whom. Move along ! " he said per-
emptorily. There was no mistake as to what he
meant.

At that moment a girl's voice, fresh, sweet, full
of spring, breathing romance, trilled from the house.
Genslow looked the Superintendent square in the
eye. That voice gave him his triumph and he took
it to the full for the space of two seconds. As he
looked, he knew by that instinct which had come
down from the time when the first man alertly
watched the eye of a crouching beast, that the
rush, the clutch, the elemental trial by strength of
arm was near at hand. Lena's voice sounded,
humming, in the little garden. Genslow took a
deep breath, looked again meaningly into Johnson's
ominous eye, and turned on his heel and walked
away.

Johnson looked after him, the muscles of his jaw
stiffened, his brain given over to the stupid fighting
wrath. Lena was close at hand. He heard the
soft humming of her voice across the hedge and
the swish of the bushes as her hand moved bird-
Uke among them, gathering berries. At once he

114

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

seemed to see himself clutching, striking, rolling
on the ground like a fighting dog. An abject fear
of meeting Lena's eye overcame him. He hurried
away overwhelmed with shame. What good would
that do — to act like a truculent drayman? What
good would that do? What made him a bully?
He hurried on, astonished at himself, asham.ed,
confused. What good would that do ? How he
bungled things ! Above all, how he wronged
Lena ! He felt an immense dejection, in which
he appealed confusedly to the mellow dusk of the
evening, the warm, whispering air in the leaves, the
smell of earth's green fecund things. Why was
he left aside, heavy, rude, alone, bungling ? He
hurried on, mechanically taking the direction he had
planned, but without noticing his surroundings.

The dingy frame building occupied by the Silver
Dollar saloon fronted on River Street. As John-
son hurried abstractedly around that corner he came
upon Biggs and two others emerging from the
saloon. At the first glance his mind aroused, the
confusion slipped away, he was alert, practical,
ready.

The Superintendent looked up and nodded grimly.
In the mere instant of looking up he observed the
man at Biggs's right, — a young fellow with a de-
generate face, now somewhat flushed with drink, —
and his eye caught an odd, fearing, startled arrest in
this man's face as their glances met. Johnson iden-
tified the young fellow as a stoker. He went on

115

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

three rods, then looked around quickly. The three
men were standing on the saloon steps looking after
him. Even at that distance he could see that the
stoker's mouth was open as though he had not fully
recovered his breath.

Johnson walked on, alive, attentive, his mind at
work. Only a vacant stretch of the flat lay between
him and the works. At his right the river flowed
serenely in the dusk, softly lapping the stones that
built up the roadway on its bank. The fiery crown
of the forge danced in ever-changing motion. One
end and the long perspective of the flank of the big
building were in Johnson's view. It seemed abso-
lutely empty, deserted, at peace. When he came
nearer, his upturned, searching eye caught the flash
and glimmer of a watchman's dark lantern in the
top story. He went on, skirting the long side of
the parallelogram. All was still, orderly. Through
the windows of the squat, detached smithy, he
could see the forms of the half-dozen men of the
night shift at their sweaty work. This long flank
of the big building was unbroken by any entrance
save the big double iron doors opposite the smithy.
The other flank was exposed to the view of the
town. The iron doors were securely locked.
Johnson stopped. The stoker persisted in his
mind, and he turned back. The engine-room oc-
cupied a little addition, a mere brick-box thrown
out like a toe from the foot of the big building.
The lifting ground had been cut away here for a

ii6

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

level foundation, and the box of the engine-room
huddled against the cut bank so that it was almost
hidden from the town.

Johnson remembered something more. The room
in which crates were made occupied the corner of
the main building immediately adjoining the engine-
room. A small door, always locked, opened between
them. This position of the crate-room was con-
venient for shipping. A- spur of railroad track ran
along the town side of the plant. But the proxim-
ity of the combustibles to the engine-room was not
satisfactory. A sequence of ideas was forming in
Johnson's mind. He quickened his steps like a
man who had forgotten something. The box of
the engine-room seemed still enough as he peered
uncertainly in at the dirty window-pane. From the
bunch of keys in his hip pocket he selected one,
applied it to the small door next to the wall of the
main shop, and entered the cave-like room which
contained the boilers and the engine. The smell
of smoke and burning wool assailed his nostrils.
In a moment he saw it, — a pile of oily engine
waste flung down on the two wooden steps lead-
ing to the small locked door which communicated
with the crate-room. The pile was smoking in a
leisurely sort of way. A breath of air came through
the opened outer door, and a bright little tongue of
flame curled up from the waste.

One could not say what that heap of oily wool
might contain. Johnson was upon it in a second,

117

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

seizing it with both hands, flinging it out on the
cement floor. His grasping hands encountered
something rough, hard, heavy, and piping hot that
seared the flesh ; then they got into something wet
that bit the burns. A mere five seconds' furious
work finished it. On the cement floor a fierce little
bonfire was burning harmlessly with the crackle and
fury of an inflammable oil. The odor of the oil was
in Johnson's nostrils. His seared hands reeked and
stung with it, — turpentine.

A couple of big, rough, hot cinders from the fur-
nace lay on the cement beside the bonfire. It
was quite plain, — two hot cinders wrapped up
and smothered in dry waste ; waste saturated with
engine oil put over it ; then, on the top step, against
the door, waste soaked in turpentine, the whole
making a clumsy but fairly trustworthy slow fuse
which might smoulder on for an hour, possibly,
before the turpentine caught. Johnson stooped and
smelled of the door — turpentine. He put his finger
in the crack under the door, and it came out wet and
smarting. He had no key to that door. It was
always locked.

It took him perhaps ten minutes to go around
through the various shops to the crate-room and find
where the turpentine had been spilled on the floor
and over the loose shavings. The palms and
fingers of both hands were seared where he had
grasped the hot cinders. He found some dry waste
and wrapped them up clumsily. Then he went

ii8

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

over the plant carefully and cautioned the two
watchmen.

It was after ten when he finally turned toward
home. Across the railroad tracks he stopped and
looked back. The long bulk of the works loomed,
still, dark, safe. His burned hands stung and ached.
He was conscious of that as he looked back at the
looming plant.

He was that plant ! He, Johnson, was the brain,
the will, the soul of that pile of rough brick ! He
had kept the works going ! These last three years
of fierce competition, while Maiden, aging, relaxing,
more and more infatuated with his doctrines, more
and more loosened the master's grasp, it had been
he, Johnson, who bore the brunt and pulled the
thing through. When destruction impended, it was
he, Johnson, who was at hand to leap in and ward
it off, — not Maiden ! A strange, grim exultation
filled him, as though he could diffuse his mind
through those various bare shops ; as though he could
incorporate those rough brick walls with himself.
He hated the works, — never more than just now, —
but nobody could take them away from him ! They
were himself?

The house was dark when he reached home.
He opened the screen door and entered the living-
room in front. As he stepped toward the door of
his own room, a shadow beside the window stirred.
He paused, aware that Lena was sitting there alone
in the dark, — she was such a little, young thing.

119

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

" All alone ? " he called cheerily.

She did not answer for a moment. Then her
sweet, fresh voice sounded in the dark. " Mrs.
Maiden is n't going to invite me to her harvest
party," she said simply, yet with an odd quickness.
There was an indefinable pull on Johnson's nerves
as he caught the effect of her suppressed excitement.
" I 've just been up to Jen Presley's. She is n't
invited either. The other girls got their invitations
two days ago, and Jen and I are not to be invited."

" I 'm sorry, Lena," was all he could think of to
say at the moment. He referred it to Genslow.

" Everybody will know about it," she added.
He comprehended the effect, to her, of a publicly
pronounced judgment, of a brand conspicuously
applied. It seemed abominably cruel, — femininely
cruel. Some hot words came to his lips. Then
he remembered Genslow and himself at the back
gate ; and he suspected that Lena knew of that.

As though his mind lay open to her, she said in a
moment, " William, did you forbid Ben — Gens-
low to come here ? "

" Yes, I did, Lena," he said, with an odd reluc-
tance ; and he spoke in his kindliest voice. " You
know what I think of him. But if he would come
to the front door like a man — "

" So you could kick him out, William ? " the
sweet voice asked.

Johnson felt the wall rise between them. They
would only quarrel. He went on to the little room

1 20

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

especially his own, behind the living-room. It took
him some time to light the lamp because of his ban-
daged hands. Lena's sweet, childish voice rang in
his ears. What were those strange noises they had
been making at each other, — those vocal utterances
which the brain seemed to interpret, but which
served only to alienate them ? Why had n't he
simply barked at her and trotted by ? Why must
it always work out to her injury ?

It was the Maidens who had worked that refined
cruelty upon her, — stupid and useless. That is,
the feminine Maidens, for it was a woman's cruelty.
That blow, aimed at his sorest and tenderest spot,
had been delivered by the fair hands on the hill !
He looked down at his own bandaged hands, and for
a moment he wished to laugh. He felt the stir and
uplifting of a big wrathful pov/er within him. For
a moment it seemed that he might clutch the walls
of the plant with the arms of a Samson and crush
them. That long bulk of rough brick, empty, dark,
peaceful, serenely stupid, yet holding the soul of his
passion, — why did not this intolerable tangle of
human lives become dynamic and blow it up ?

He went over to the desk, fumbled out an old
envelope containing the certificate of his stock in the
Company. He stood with the envelope in his ban-
daged hands, staring down at it. Had not the time
come, as Dyer said, to wind it all up ?

But Dyer might have his own interest —

121

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

The stir grew in High Grove. No night but John-
son went over to the works, surprising the watchmen
at odd hours. He went about among the men con-
tinually, working with the better-disposed to prevent
the strike which everybody felt trembling in a bal-
ance. It was the crisis.

Maiden himself was half bewildered. These
strange, new forces which had abruptly shouldered
their way into his well-ordered world perplexed him.
He relied more and more upon Johnson. The
Superintendent had succeeded in several instances
where the President had failed. The men must
believe in Johnson, — one of themselves, brought up
in the Maiden system, a living testimonial to its
efficacy.

The mass meeting at which the strike would be
again debated was to be held Monday. Sunday
evening Maiden and his wife sat on the deep veranda.
Dyer and Miss Maiden had been there a moment
before. They had talked over the situation very
frankly, as in a family council, all under the sense
of the impending crisis.

" If they strike, I suppose it means ruin," said
Maiden, quietly.

The ominous word brought a silence in which
Dyer, lounging against a pillar, studied the floor.

" It may mean ruin for the Company," he sug-
gested. " But ruin is n't the last word, fortunately."

IZ2

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

He strolled along the porch and sat down at Julia's
feet. " A good deal may come after the bankruptcy-
court," he added, for her.

Presently the elders, busy with their money trouble,
were aware of the young ones loitering across the
lawn. Here and there, at farther and farther spaces,
they caught sight of the two figures walking near
together through the shrubbery. Syringa, rose,
and lilac bushes and dwarf evergreens grew near
the gravel roadway which skirted the edge of the
grounds and led from the street to the stables.
Dyer and Miss Maiden had been standing still for
some minutes, his straw hat in his left hand, in his
right a white rose with a long stem. There was
absolute silence save for the murmurous voices of
the night.

" It always had to be you — from the very begin-
ning," she said presently, looking up at him. " That
was inevitable."

" Yes ; it was inevitable ! " he repeated quickly,

with a note of triumph. " Only — dear woman !

I wish I might have come sooner. I wish we might
have come sooner. You were a long time on the
way. And I know you had a bad time ! "

" I suppose we all, except you, dreamed something
else a long time ago. It was a beautiful dream ; but
it would n't work out, it would n't come true. I
tried honestly to live up to it, and I 've tried other
things ; tried them with all my heart ; but they
would n't work out true. Sometimes I seemed to be

123

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

succeeding ; but something always stood in the way
— the inevitable, I suppose — and you. Everything
else failed finally. And now — I 'm glad, dear ! I 'm
glad!" He felt in her eyes, her voice, her whole
person, the great rest, the sinking back to peace.
"Truly glad ? " he insisted.

"Truly glad! If — only William will under-
stand — now.'*

" He will understand," said Dyer, comfortingly,
with the victor's easy magnanimity. " He is one
who is capable of understanding."

There was the rustle and brisk swishing of shrub-
bery near at hand. The large figure of a man re-
vealed itself coming through the bushes. Dyer
dropped Miss Maiden's hands. The intruding figure
halted abruptly ; began mumbling something apolo-
getically ; was already backing hastily away from
the tableau which obviously was not posed for spec-
tators.

" William ! William! Is that you ? " Miss Mai-
den's voice called.

" Come on, Johnson," Dyer's voice seconded.
The Superintendent paused, looking back at the
two figures standing close together.

"Were you coming to the house — to see father? "
Miss Maiden encouraged.

" Yesi — I was coming," said Johnson. They
were waiting; and he came slowly back, facing
them, waiting also. He saw that Dyer was re-
garding him with an open, friendly look; that

124

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

Miss Maiden was bending toward him, eager,
inviting.

" Father is on the porch. Arthur will tell him
you are here," she said.

Dyer regarded Johnson with that friendly look,
then spoke under his breath to Miss Maiden. " Shall
I tell them?" he asked.

She considered swiftly. " Yes," she said quickly,
with a swift upward look which subtly put herself
into his hands.

Dyer turned lightly away, disappearing through
the shrubbery, leaving the others alone.

" Mr. Dyer and I are engaged, William," was the
first thing she said — softly.

" I 'm glad of it. It should have been long ago.
I 'm glad of it," said Johnson, rapidly. " I 've been
expecting it four years. It 's fit. It winds the
thing up. I 'm going away myself. I came up to tell
your father. I 'm going to leave the works." He
spoke all this like a man delivering an unpleasant
message, nervously. Then he added, in the same
abrupt way : " My sister has run off with Genslow."

" Ah — Lena ? "

" Lena. I got the telegram this afternoon. They
were married in Illinois City yesterday," he said in
the same quick, hard voice.

She took a step nearer, bending toward him,
agitated, her face drawn. " I could n't do any-
thing ! " she cried. " I could n't do anything to
help you even there ! Even with Lena, where I

125

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

might have helped so much, I never helped at all.
I 've never really helped in any vi^ay ! "

" Well — the snub — over the party — cost me
something — " he began.

« And I did it ! I did it ! " she exclaimed. " My
mother determined it — and I let myself go. I
felt helpless to go back, then, and tell her what had
happened — long ago. I felt myself bound. I did
that meanness — to your sister. Imagine that !
Then you '11 begin to understand us Maidens.
You don't know the family, William — nor me,
either. Selfishness paralyzes me in the end. I 'm
glad you 're going away, where you '11 have a fair
chance. I 've hurt you enough."

Her humility touched his hard mood. " Don't
blame yourself," he said simply. " I have felt hard
and fighting sometimes, I admit. But it melts when
I see you and hear you. Never mind. The dream
was good if it did n't come true. I thank you for
it, Julia."

"No; but you — you, William. You've been
true. Everything has been put over on your
shoulders. You 've even kept the works going.
I'd have known that myself if Arthur hadn't told
me so. Somebody has to pay, and you 've paid,
paid, paid all the time. When the one thing comes
along where we might do something — Lena —
what is it we do ? What do I do ? You've been
empty-handed all along. It 's you who are empty-
handed and cheated in the end."

126

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

" Do you think that ? Do you believe it ? " he
demanded swiftly. " Don't you ever think it
again ! Don't you ever believe it I Don't I know
right now that you 've paid most, after all j that my
hands are most full ? See ! When I knew you,
then your cheeks were pink. You had the air of
spring. There was an evening in the orchard
under the apple blossoms, and you were just like
them. That was eight years ago. It was soon
over, maybe, — our dream. But the bloom, the
fragrance, the spring, were for me ! That can't
come back : it 's only once in a lifetime. You 're
wiser now ; richer probably in every other way.
But the spring has passed. Nobody that ever sees
you in a garden again will think that you 've just
been shaken out of the apple blossoms. You
understand, Julia ? I want you to know how much
I 've had. You can't ever again sit on a bench
with a man in overalls, and glory because he is poor.
I knew when it began to fail, and you knew. I
suppose neither of us knows just why it failed.
Maybe I got too ambitious and too prosperous. My
mother and your father and mother were in the
way. No matter. It might have ended there, I
might have gone away. It might have faded out.
But it was big and vital enough to hold us both.
I turned to the works. I made you the works, —
you and me. I kept them going for you. They 've
been kept going because they had to go. I made
them go, and I lived in that. It ended for you

127

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

first because it had to. This thing eats one up ;
destroys one. I lasted longer because I was all
hard bone. It 's eaten me. But was n't it great i*
Do you think it hasn't been worth while ? "

" William ! " she bent toward him, her eyes
shining, speaking low. " I 'm glad I 'm old ! I 'm
glad I look old; glad there's no more color in my
face ! Maybe that is a strange thing for a woman
to say — especially one who has just become en-
gaged, and who is very fond — But it is fit. If
it had faded out easily for me, I should have been
abject before you now. I'm glad that other time
belonged entirely to you, and that you took it all,
every bit ! That time had to belong to you, as
much — "

He nodded encouragingly. "Yes, as much as
this time has to belong to somebody else. At last
we 're free — "

The complaint of the shrubbery, parted by a hurry-
ing, heavy figure interrupted, and Maiden came out
before them, joyously impatient over the news Dyer
had divulged.

He went straight up to Julia and put his hand
on her shoulder, beaming at her.

"Stopping to talk business — now?'* he asked
jokingly, and turned urbanely to Johnson, holding
out his hand.

"Something new, William ? " he asked cheerily.

" Yes ; something new. I 'm going away. I
came up to tell you."

128

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

Maiden's eyebrows moved, — a slight sign of
annoyance. " It 's hardly an opportune time.
Something urgent ? " he asked.

"I *m going away for good. I *m going to quit
the works," said Johnson, simply.

" What ! Leave ? Desert ? " Maiden stared at
him incredulously.

" I hope you '11 not call it that," said Johnson,
mildly.

" But I should call it that ! Nonsense ! What !
Leave the works ? Now ? " Maiden exclaimed
vehemently. " Nonsense ! I expect to get in
some more money now. We 're in the very thick
of the fight. The crisis is right at hand. And
the men — explain yourself, Johnson ! What do
you mean ? "

" I mean simply, Mr. Maiden, that I am offered
a position at Illinois City, and I think it best to take
it."

"Illinois — with the trust? The trust? It's
shameful, Johnson ! You 're selling me out ! "

"Oh, father!" Julia expostulated.

" Julia ! " the patriarch warned, in his deepest
voice. "I call it ingratitude ! "

" Father I Please ! "

"Julia! I've taken this man up; pushed him
along. What I A man that I 've made and that I
trusted as much as my own flesh and blood I At
the very crisis, when Arthur might put in more
money, he sells me out."
9 129

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

" Hardly that, Mr. Maiden," said Johnson, pa-
tiently. " I *m merely resigning my position. I
suppose any man has the right to do that."

" Oh, the right ! The right ! I had the right to
let you and your mother starve ! I would n't have
believed it of a dog."

" Father ! " she stepped between him and John-
son.

" Be still, Julia ! " he commanded wrathfully.
"Don't interfere between me and one of my work-
men. It is not the province of my daughter. I '11
tell him to his face — "

" Your daughter and your workman were once
engaged to be married. Consider that before you
tell him ! "

Maiden stared at her, his eyebrows working up
and down, utterly unable to take in the sense of her
words, confused as though she had spoken in a
strange tongue.

"I loved William Johnson, and promised to marry
him," she repeated with a little stress on each word.

Maiden's jaw dropped. He still stared at her
like a man paralyzed, bereft of the power of speech
and action, his eyebrows moving in that odd way as
though his brain were visibly laboring to take in
this stunning idea.

" Oh, father ! father ! Can't you understand ? "
she cried, with a burst of heroic impatience and pity.
" It was you who always insisted upon the glorious
possibilities of democracy. You talked of the noble

130

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

condition of the workman. You preached our sa-
cred duty to the poor and lowly. You grew
enthusiastic over applied Christianity. And while
you were in the library preaching to your friends,
William and I were outside dreaming of living it.
What could have been simpler or more natural ?
Can't you understand? I hadn't the least doubt
then that I should marry him."

" Him ? You ? " Maiden articulated.

" We were sincere, and you were not. For we
knew it was no use asking your consent — and
mother's — then. The dream would n't come true.
But it was so fine — he was so fine — that I honor
him apart from all other men. It is n't for my
father to insult such a one."

Maiden, still groping and gasping mentally, per-
ceived enough so that his eyes fell. "I '11 say no
more," he muttered. But he looked up at her in an
instant with a fresh trouble.

" But Arthur ? " he stammered, quailing before
the new fright which might now come out of this
pit.

"Why, naturally, Arthur knows all about it. He
has known from the beginning. He knew at the
time," she said patiently.

" All along ? " he repeated incredulously.

" All along. Arthur could always understand,"
she said.

Maiden looked at her with a fixed, pathetic blank-
ness, while the perception took its full form in his

131

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

mind. His (laughter engaged to William Johnson ;
Arthur Dyer — almost one of the family — knowing
it for years; these people about him, touching his
life at every moment ; all this going on in his snug,
good little world that he had seemed to know so
thoroughly and to be guiding so surely !

"Well, there seems to have been — h*m — to
have been a lot going on here that I never dreamed
of," he said with simple, bewildered helplessness.

"Oh, dear father, such a lot! Human nature
— the big forces that have their way in spite of
everybody! Dear father, you see it has all come
out right, if not as you planned. Dear father ! '*
she held his hand between her palms.

"Yes — certainly not as I planned. You 're go-
ing, William, — to Illinois City ? " he asked meekly.

" I think it best. You can't win this fight, Mr.
Maiden. A number of the men are going with
me.

"And I suppose the rest will strike," said the
manufacturer.

" Perhaps. But all the capable ones can find
work at Illinois City. The extension to that plant
is nearly finished. They 're taking on new men to
run it. There never would have been any trouble
about the men finding work."

The manufacturer was looking at him, trying to
assort this new idea with the other new ones.

" Mr. Maiden, let me tell you. As long as
five years ago, conditions that no man could hinder

132

THE PLANT AT HIGH GROVE

began writing ofF this plant. Illinois City was the
place to make the plows. You held out against it.
I fought it, with all my might, night and day — be-
cause she was in my mind then. You understand ?
It was only a question of time. But a man in a
corner, with his back to the wall, likes to grit his
teeth and make the time as long as he can. Now,
don't you see, there is no longer any reason — any
motive — "

Maiden looked at his Superintendent with a hum-
ble and melancholy smile. " Because my daughter
is engaged to Arthur Dyer ! " he said. Suddenly he
threw up his hands, like one utterly giving it up.
" Let it come ! Let the trust come as soon as it
hkes ! One man's plans, after all — what does a
man know ? I used to think my plans important,
too. Oh, well — h'm — will you come up to the
house, William ? "

" I 've a good deal to attend to to-night. I must
get back," said Johnson, quietly. He glanced at
Miss Maiden.

" Good-night," he said, going.

A pressure from Julia's hand stayed Maiden as
he was about to turn away. He stood beside her
silently while she watched Johnson's big figure out
of sight. Then they turned to the house.

133

IV
THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

THE
CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

THE thick glass panel of the office door
bore the modest sign, " D. O. Emmet,
Lawyer." Miss Prescott stood by the
broad window in the outer room, look-
ing idly down upon the roofs of the passing street
cars in Washington Street, a hundred feet below.
The door to the inner room was wide open.
Miss Prescott had sauntered out five minutes before,
because it had occurred to her that all the business
of the interview respecting the Children's Play-
grounds Bill was really done. That had occurred
also to the Secretary of the Prairie Avenue Social
Settlements League and to the Chairman of the
Senate Committee on Cities. Still they lingered in
there. As for Emmet, lingering had got to be a
vocation with him whenever this tall young lady
was concerned.

^37

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

" I wish that Electric Consolidation Bill was
well out of the way," he was saying, with preoc-
cupied abruptness. If he looked worried, it was so
fleeting an expression that the Secretary could not
be sure. He came back at once to his confident
manner. " But I mean that it shall be j I'm send-
ing a man to work on it now."

Somewhere in the background of Miss Page's
mind flitted a question as to what the Electric Con-
solidation Bill had to do with the Children's Play-
grounds Bill ; but she let it flit. Other things
were more interesting, and she knew that she was
lingering.

She was smiling at him, a little vaguely. '' Well,
I shall go to Springfield, Tuesday — I hope it
will go through." She looked down and brushed
her neatly gloved fingers along the edge of the
desk.

As a kind of discovery, Emmet found her, in
that small, abstracted action, inexpressibly feminine.

" It 's pretty hard for you down there," he said
— so personally that there was a little commotion in
the Secretary's pulse.

" Yes ; sometimes it 's pretty hard — and not al-
ways quite pleasant with some of the people. But — "
she smiled — "a good many things are pretty hard."

The Chairman stepped over to her, his head
bent slightly, his eyes glowing down at her so that
she felt the big nervous force in him beating against
her polite defences, and an underthought complained

"38

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

that he was a dreadfully ardent, uncontrolled sort of
man.

" No ! Don't go down there again," he said ab-
ruptly. " There 's no need. It 's just getting your
bill reported by my committee. Leave it to me.
I want to do something ! "

" But I 've engaged to go," she protested ner-
vously, steadily looking down. " Mrs. Randall
thought I ought to."

" No ! " he repeated. " I know better than Mrs.
Randall. If you don't leave it to me, I '11 beat your
bill ! The committee sha'n't report it at all ! " He
was laughing ; but the laugh did not allay the ob-
truding self-consciousness of either.

" Oh, if it 's a question of life or death, of course
I surrender ! " She laughed too, in the same ner-
vous way. " If you think that 's best," she added
rather humbly, for the laugh would not hold out j
and she started for the door.

As Emmet took the first step beside her, his hand
brushed her sleeve, so that it could scarcely be said
whether he had touched her or detained her for the
wink of an eye.

" Thank you ! I won't forget ! " he said tremu-
lously, under his breath ; and they got to the door
together.

Returning to the inner room from ushering the
two ladies out, and closing the door behind him,
Emmet kept assuring himself, amid the endless
turmoil in his mind, that nothing whatever had

139

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

happened. There was that thrill in his veins from
the mere gossamer touch of her sleeve, and it turned
his brain volatile ; but he assured himself that no-
thing had happened. So he sat down by the window
and looked into the street without seeing anything,
and in ten seconds jumped up and began pacing the
room. A chair drifted his way, and he dropped into
it only to spring up again. Once he found him-
self gripping the top of the low bookcase in his
two strong hands, as though he were going to
coerce it into acknowledging that nothing had
happened. He kept thinking of himself in odd,
disconnected pieces.

When the " Clarion " published its estimate of
city candidates for the legislature, this paragraph
appeared under his name and senatorial district :

" Democrat. Age 27. Born in Cook County. Lawyer.
An unknown quantity. Well educated ; good speaker.
But owes his nomination to Johnny Gallagher. Has some
respectable friends, who say he is better than his sponsors.
Looks dubious."

It looked dubious to Emmet himself just then.
He had told her once that he believed in practical
politics. He thought he had never been a bad
fellow. But there had been a certain carelessness,
a certain free-handed liberalness, in his politics.
Especially there was this affair of the electric bill.
It came back to him in a kind of lump. Also she
came back to him just as she had stood there be-

140

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

side the desk. It seemed to him that a wise and
just Providence might well personally prevent that
presence from coming any further into affairs that
looked so dubious ; and he made a little prayer to
her, or to the Providence, or to both, to the effect
that, if she would come in, he would get himself
all spotlessly cleaned up and be worthy of her.

It looked rather more than dubious to Mr. Gordon
Prescott, President of the Consolidated Light and
Power Company, — a stocky man of fifty, explosive
at times, with a patch of close-cropped red whisker
on each ruddy cheek. Even his bald head was
pink, as though to carry out the sanguine color
scheme.

He was explaining it to the men in the smoking-
room after dinner : " So this gang in the City
Council got up a paper concern that they called
the Metropolitan Electric Company, and passed an
ordinance for it. Then, when thev could n't sell it
out to me or to the South Side Illuminating Com-
pany, they turned it over to Johnny Gallagher. He
got some money and built a shed that he calls a
power-station on the west side, and strung some
wires, and pretended to go into the electric-lighting
business. Well, my company and the South Side
Illuminating get around to the point where we 're
willing to go in together, to consolidate. We can

141

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

save ;$200,ooo a year by it, and give just as good
and cheap a service to the public. The lawyers
look it over, and find that there '11 have to be a little
amendment to the State Incorporation Law. They
fix up the amendment and introduce it into the
Senate. Then it 's referred to the Committee on
Cities, instead of to the Committee on Corpora-
tions, as it should be, and we find out that Johnny
Gallagher owns that committee, body, boots, and
breeches, and we 've got to make terms with him,
and buy out his rotten Metropolitan Company at
his price, or our amendment will be hung up. It 's
just damnable. Nice mess for ladies to be mixed up
in with their Playgrounds Bill ! And this fellow,
Emmet, that Miss Page quoted to us, is chairman of
that committee ! He '11 pick her pockets if she
don't look out ! "

III

Nevertheless, the fellow Emmet bore no out-
ward marks of degeneracy as, on Monday about
noon, he entered the inner room on the upper
floor of one of the least pretentious buildings in La
Salle Street.

This inner room was a mere closet, with only a
desk and a couple of chairs. The man at the desk
wore a Derby hat tilted back on his globular head.
He was middle-aged, with broad shoulders and a
firm, flat chest, leanly muscular. A dark-reddish
beard, cut short, grew high over his cheek-bones.

142 .

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

He merely glanced up as the shining presence burst
in.

The Chairman never had his effect of sparkling
more perfectly. Such was his air of youthful
buoyancy and vigor that it seemed simply optional
with him whether he stopped or kept straight on
through the wall.

However, he dropped at once into the chair at the
end of the desk, bending forward in his eagerness.

"They'll give ;^350,ooo for the Metropolitan,
John," he said. " I 've just had word from Win-
throp. He makes the offer." There was a vi-
brant quality in the young man's voice. His eyes
shone happily.

The shrewd eyes of the elder, lustreless man
twinkled a little in his unanswering face. Even
then Emmet was the dearest joke of his humorous
heart. But this was business.

" Three fifty, eh ? " he said calmly.

The coolness irritated Emmet's heat. "Of course
I 've taken this up on my own motion," he said.
"I sent a man to Winthrop because I wanted
it settled and out of the way. You know I
don't like it. Whatever we may say among our-
selves, we're using a public position for our own
advantage. Now, good gracious, John, this is a
handsome offer, a generous offer ! We can just
take it and get the thing cleaned up and off our
hands."

Gallagher looked at the young man imper-

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

turbably. " Did you accept their generous offer,
Dan'l ? " he asked softly.

When he said " Dan'l/' it was always subtly a
gibe and a reproof.

" Of course I did n't," Emmet flung back im-
patiently. "You know I can't do that. But I
did tell my man that Winthrop had made a good
offer," he added challengingly.

Thereupon a series of deep wrinkles came length-
wise in Gallagher's forehead. The edge of his
scalp moved down. His eyebrows arched and
moved up. His large mouth expanded on lateral
lines until his strong back teeth were exposed, and
a mighty grin stood revealed. It seemed to go so
deep that it interfered with the production of his
voice, which came out strained and hoarse.

" That shows your kind heart, Dan'l," he gasped
out of the grin. " I 'm sure it would comfort
Winthrop to know you told your man that. He'd
know he was right, even if I do turn him down."

Emmet stared coldly at the grin. The check to
.his plans touched his fiery impatience to anger.
He was bent so ardently upon getting this one
affair of the electric concern out of the way. He
thought he had succeeded. Now this big, bull-like
will stood in his way.

" You don't mean you 're going to be such a fool
as turn the offer down ? " he said quickly. " It 's
the best you '11 ever get. You 're overreaching
yourself. Your partners won't thank you for it."

144

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

He knew he was insulting ; but in his anger he
did not care. Gallagher's anger was different. He
compressed his lips. He narrowed his steady eyes.
He waited.

" Besides, I tell you," Emmet added boldly,
"there are public questions involved."

When Johnny had himself firmly in hand, he
said calmly : " You ain't got over being a kid yet,
Dan'l. What you want is a rattle. You 're a
toddler, and you slobber on your bib, talking of
generosity. Where is any public question ? We 're
in the electric business, ain't we, same 's Win-
throp's men ? Prescott and the South Side Illumi-
nating are going to consolidate because they see
a chance to make a couple of million or so out of
it. I 'm a sociable person, Dan'l ; I want to be
consolidated with the rest of the boys. When
they get good and consolidated, they '11 come over
and try to take my little electric business away
from me. It '11 make hard feelings. Let 's all
go in snug and friendly and get consolidated to-
gether, and let 's all get a whack at the two
millions. Those fellows have gone into the stock
market and loaded up with Consolidated Light and
Power and South Side Illuminating stock, and
they 're all ready to turn the trick — only " — his
strident voice shot out — "they can't do it until
I say so. Generous ! I 've got 'em in a corner,
ain't I ? I 've got 'em by the scruff of the neck,
ain't I ? They can't wiggle unless I let 'em, can
lo 145

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

they ? And you talk about their generosity to me,
Dan'l ? Tell 'em I say, ' T' hell with their gen-
erosity/ When they get ready to offer me half
a million, I '11 talk with 'em. You want a rattle !
Mr. Gordon Prescott and Mr. Thomas Frederick
Winthrop — my old friend, smooth Petroleum
Tommy — and the rest, course they've got a
right to make as much money consolidating as
they please, because they 're all prominent citizens,
riding in carriages and throwing flowers at them-
selves. They can rig the stock market and play
horse with the minority stockholders, and make
all the money they want to. But if I want to get
in on the game and make some money, they hold
up their hands in holy horror because my clothes
ain't ally mode and I was brought up over by the
stockyards. It 's your idea, Dan'l, that, if we want
anything, we must go around to the back door with
our hats off. It sort of jars you to think your
Uncle John 's going to kick open the front door
and walk into the parlor and demand pie. You 're
afraid they '11 consider him rude and never let him
auction off the boxes for the charity ball. You
think if you take the sandwich and don't ask for
butter, they '11 like you for a well-trained lad, and
give you a certificate that you 're respectable. But
you watch your Uncle John win their heartfelt
respect, — which he will do by handing it out to
'em so fast and strong that their heads swim and
their knees knock together."

146

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

" What do you propose to do ? " Emmet de-
manded shortly.

" You wait and see," said Gallagher.

" But I don't want to wait ! " Emmet cried hotly.
" I want to know. I want to clean this thing up,
John, and get out of it."

" Seems to me you kind of take it to heart,
Dan'l," Johnny observed coolly.

" Oh, drop that, will you ? " Emmet roared.
" Treat me as a man, will you ? "

The preliminaries of the grin appeared. " When
you grow up, Dan'l ; when you grow up."

" Then, you understand, I 'm out of this ! "
Emmet sprang up. " I 'm out of it. I '11 have
nothing more to do with it ! "

Gallagher's eyes again narrowed, and again he
waited a moment. He stood up also, and com-
pressed his lips. " T' hell with you, Dan'l," he
said cheerfully. "The Metropolitan is a grown
person's game. If you don't like it, get out. Go
back on me, if you feel that way. I can get along
without you."

" Get along, then ! " said Emmet, and burst from
the room so impetuously that he brushed against one
of Gallagher's lieutenants.

The lieutenant entered, staring ; found Johnny
still standing by the desk, his hands in his
pockets J asked, " What 's the matter ? " under his
breath.

Gallagher's narrowed, leaden eyes looked steadily

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

by the lieutenant for a moment, then came gloomily
to the man's nervous face.

" Oh, these colts, Jakey ! these colts ! " he said
wearily. " Dan Emmet is nutty and full of oats.
He's bound to run away. He's going to run right
into a stone wall, and there ain't going to be any
upholstering on that wall, either." He reached over
and closed the rolling top of his desk. " I 'm going
to hand Dan'l a little package," he said, still most
gloomily, "and after the explosion, if he lives
through it, he '11 know more."

When he got home, to a very snug house on the
west side, where there was always the romping of
lusty children, his wife noticed the overcast mood.
In the front room, where Johnny smoked his cigar
and read his evening newspaper, Mrs. Gallagher
finally asked, " Anything wrong, Johnny ? "

Gallagher glanced up. " I 'm bothered about
Dan Emmet," he said.

" Oh ! about Dan ? " The plump, comely,
motherly woman waited a moment, her anxious
heart in her throat. Johnny smoked thoughtfully,
then took up his newspaper, and she knew he would
not tell her then.

Mr. Winthrop had been notified of the failure of
his offer, and Emmet had taken the evening train
for Springfield.

148

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

Thomas Frederick Winthrop, who was Prescott's
attorney, received the notification with his habitual
blandness. But there was the sense of a painful
swelling in the region of his heart. Standing in the
centre of his private office on a rug of price beside
a desk of carved mahogany with shiny silver trim-
mings, his startled eyes travelled with slow aimless-
ness over the dull red walls which matched the
mahogany so beautifully. In fact, Mr. Winthrop
was personally "long" a big line of South Side
Illuminating and Consolidated Light and Power
shares, and his margins were so uncomfortably thin
that he could easily see ruin through them if any-
thing happened to the consolidation plan.

There was a small mahogany cabinet in the lava-
tory off his room. He hurried to it, got out a
beautiful cut-glass decanter, and took a large drink.

Wednesday, his confidential agent at Springfield
wired: " Row on this morning in Senate Committee
on Cities. Emmet tried to get the Playgrounds Bill
reported out. Committee slaughtered it. Emmet
mad. Talk of row between Emmet and Gallagher.
May affect the Electric Bill.'*

Then his broker called up on the telephone.
Somebody on the Stock-Exchange was selling Light
and Power and Illuminating to beat the band. They
said there was a row at Springfield and the consolida-
tion bill was mixed up in it some way.

Evidently something must be done. So Mr.
Winthrop applied himself to the decanter for an

149

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

Inspiration, and to make his nerves stop feeling so
sick.

Miss Page, shopping on State Street and mainly
intent upon the new patterns in waists, heard the
cry, bought a copy of The Express^ and went into
Field's to read it.

For firm ground the correspondent had only the
fact that Emmet called up the Playgrounds Bill in
his committee. Smooth sailing had been expected
for it. But the committee had ruthlessly relegated
it to the files. Emmet had left the Capitol and gone
to his hotel, where he refused an interview. The
report was that the Chairman and Gallagher had
fallen out some way because they could n't agree on
the electric matter. But others said it was just a
dodge. An unnamed "Democratic Member" was
quoted : " When it comes to making terms with the
electric companies for letting that amendment go
through, you '11 find there won't be any row in
Johnny's camp." The newspaper's headline read :
" Is Johnny Turning a New Trick ? "

Miss Page felt a little sick. She scorned the
imputation of sordid treachery. But there was this
nameless touch of corruption and cheap rascality
which every one seemed to take for granted.
Especially, there was the picture of him, going off
alone to his hotel as though he had no friends.
And if he was angry, it must be a little bit at least on
account of that promise — Ah ! if some one had the
courage to help him. But what could a woman do ?

150

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

She sat in a very comfortable wicker chair in a
long row of like chairs occupied by waiting, or rest-
ing, or merely lounging women, presumably with
the patterns in waists on their minds. Her chair
was next a court that cut through the huge shop
from ground-floor to roof. Elevators laden with
women plied up and down. Above and below she
could see sectional vistas and glimpses of the im-
mense busy establishment crowded with hundreds
of her sex shopping, examining fabrics, gossiping,
loitering, — the moment's phase of a perpetual wo-
men's fair. She remembered that she herself had
put in two hours spending eight dollars in dry goods.
Oh, she might send him a ribbon or a shirt-waist, and
write him, on a nice little piece of tinted notepaper,
in a nice slanting little hand, that she was so sorry !

She arose and swept to the elevators. A timo-
rous lady, who was about to step into the cage at the
same time, looked up at her high chin, instinctively
murmured an apology, and drew back.

When she entered the anteroom of Mr. Win-
throp's law office, she was aware that a broad-
shouldered man in a Derby hat, whom she had over-
taken and passed blindly in the hall, was at her heels.
Mr. Winthrop was at the door of his private room.
She saw that his glance took in herself and the man
with a kind of perplexity. Nevertheless, the lawyer
bowed urbanely and stepped forward.

No very tangible programme had come to Mr.
Winthrop's mind during the afternoon, but he had

151

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

frequently resorted to the little cabinet in the lavatory.
His face was uncommonly red, and he was looking
at his trouble through an optimistic fog.

Miss Page moved forward quickly, impatient to
get separated from this strange man. " I wish you 'd
tell me the news from Springfield," she said quickly
in a low tone ; " I know only what the newspapers
say. I don't understand it.'*

The rosy mists in the lawyer's brain were not a
help to clear thinking, but they helped to jocularity.

" Why, could n't Mr. Gallagher enlighten you ? "
he asked, at his blandest, looking over her shoulder
at the man and sounding his mellow laugh.

She understood at once that it was Johnny Galla-
gher, the " boss." She took the occasion hardily, as
she found it, and turned, politely smiling. " Perhaps
Mr. Gallagher can," she said, with a kind of sociable
brightness. "I am trying to find out what has
happened at Springfield to the Playgrounds Bill, and
why it happened."

The fact that she was a pretty woman and looked
amiable made a certain impression behind Johnny's
gloom, but the shell was immobile. He thought
she was a newspaper reporter. No, he knew noth-
ing ; politics were always too deep for him. In a
half-mechanical following of the lawyer's lead, they
drifted up to the door of the inner room. " But
why don't you go to Emmet ? " Johnny suggested.
" He seems to know all about it. Have somebody
interview him."

152

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

Miss Page glanced down. " I thought Mr.
Emmet would do all he could for the bill," she said ;
" in fact, we counted on his help. We rather left
it to him."

'' Oh 1 You 're one of 'em — one of the Play-
grounds women — er, ladies ? "

" I 'm Miss Page. Mr. Emmet told me he
would undertake to get the bill favorably reported."

Johnny's interest suddenly roused. " Dan did ?
When r When did Dan say that ? " he demanded
in his harsh voice.

It seemed almost like a question of veracity.
Miss Page held up her chin. " Last Saturday,"
she answered firmly.

Gallagher looked hard at her. He was sensible
enough of her beauty and style. It was occurring
to him that Emmet would have been sensible
enough of them, too. Perhaps, after all, he had
punished the youngster more than he had meant ;
had hurt his pride more than he had intended.
But the thought subtly evoked his belligerence,
too. What business had beauty and style to get
mixed up with politics? He seemed more gloomy
than ever.

" Well, I guess he thought he could do it," he
said stolidly. " I reckon he was n't calculating to
play horse with anybody but me."

The form of the speech was baffling ; but Miss
Page jumped to a happy conclusion. " Then you
and he are really at outs ? " she said eagerly.

153

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

" We ain't singing ' Comrades ' to each other,"
said Johnny. " He sends me word he 's going to
pitch into me."

" Pitch, into you ? " She was finding it very
confusing.

Without verbal reply, Gallagher pulled a crumpled
telegram from his overcoat pocket and handed it
over. She read :

**I shall speak on the electric bill under privilege to-
morrow forenoon. I shall throw all the light I can on it.

Emmet.'*

This was more baffling than anything else. She
looked her perplexity at Gallagher. Meantime,
Mr. Winthrop blandly read the telegram in her
hand.

" Why," said the lawyer, with his large air of
amiability, " a man came to see me about the
electric bill day before yesterday, and he told me "
— the lawyer paused, smiling urbanely — " that
Emmet sent him here."

"Yes," said Miss Page. "Mr. Emmet told
me that he had sent a man to see about the
electric bill." The fact simply floated up in her
confused mind, and she handed it over blindly, as
a possible help to elucidating the puzzle.

" He did ? " cried Mr. Winthrop with animation.
He held up his distinguished head and sounded
his mellow laugh. " Why, it 's a clear case ! He
tried to make us buy out the Metropolitan Electric

154

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

Company, in which, I suppose, he 's interested, and
now he proposes to denounce Mr. Gallagher, who
has never, I can vouch, tried anything of the
kind ! "

The puzzle suddenly became dazzlingly clear
to Miss Page. Her senses reeled a little with it.
She turned to Gallagher with a kind of swift, flee-
ing, startled helplessness. "Does he mean that?
Does he mean to denounce — " she asked breath-
lessly.

The boss was looking at her with hard, narrow,
unfriendly eyes. " I read it that way," he said in
his harsh voice. She felt that he accused her.

"Well, if he does," said Mr. Winthrop, looking
at them both with urbane enjoyment, " we '11 explode
a mine under the young man's mine. With what
I know and what Miss Page knows, I guess Mr.
Gallagher won't be the man that 's blown highest."

When Gallagher walked out. Miss Page mur-
mured a polite, empty word to the lawyer, and
followed.

" Mr. Gallagher ! Mr. Gallagher ! " she called,
in the hall.

Johnny turned around stolidly, and she whirled
up to him breathlessly. " What would you advise
me to do ? " she panted.

" About what ? " the boss demanded in his stoni-
est manner.

"About — Mr. Emmet." Johnny still waited,
immovable and with as little sympathetic help as

^S5

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

a post. Before that rock-like attitude the young
woman felt her courage evaporating. " I don't
wish to do him an injury," she said evasively j " all
I care about is the Playgrounds Bill."

" Then I 'd advise you to go home, and keep
away from Winthrop if you can," said Johnny,
gloomily, as he turned away. If she had been
a little different, he would have advised her to go
soak her head.

When Gallagher stepped from the train at Spring-
field next morning, he saw Winthrop and Prescott
making their way to the street ahead of him.

At the same time, Mrs. Celia Randall, President
of the Prairie Avenue Social Settlements League,
Chairwoman of the Committee on Political Action
of the United Women's Societies, Treasurer of the
Association for the Suppression of Objectionable
Posters, and a Director of the South Side Wagner
Club, emerged from the last Pullman car.

"Here's Johnny Gallagher just ahead of us,"
she said in an aside. " You see you came down
in excellent company, Helen. I suppose there '11
be nothing fit to eat," she added, and settled her
double chin over her collar in a manner that was
eloquent.

" Oh, I guess so," Miss Page answered with a
vague attempt at cheerfulness. In the stress of
her mind there was a subcurrent which dimly did

156

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

justice to Mrs. Randall's injuries. To be swept
away bodily from an agreeable dinner, thrust into
the discomforts of a Pullman car, and carried to
Springfield in a cause one does not understand, was
surely trying to elderly nerves with a liking for ease.

Alighting from their cab at the hotel as an om-
nibus was discharging its load, they encountered
Winthrop and Prescott. Gallagher stood apart, his
hands in his trousers pockets, his overcoat on his
arm, and looked on uncompromisingly while the
other men bowed. Politer Mr. Winthrop stepped
into the hotel with the ladies. Gallagher turned his
hard, challenging glance to Prescott.

" Do you know that young lady ? " he asked in
his harshest voice.

" Miss Page ? Certainly I know her," said
Prescott, out of his surprise.

Johnny's gloomy eyes dwelt questioningly on the
sanguine man for an instant. " Come now, Pres-
cott," he demanded, "just man to man, is she on
the square ? "

Mr. Prescott flushed angrily. " You must be
drunk," he said.

The politician's hard glance still rested upon him
a second. "T'hell with you," he growled, and
went into the hotel.

Inside, Mrs. Randall was settling herself with a
sigh of relief at the breakfast table, and Mr. Win-
throp was disappearing from Miss Page's straining
eyes. It was half-past nine — when Emmet would

^S7

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

soon be starting for the Capitol ; and these men
were free to find him. To have a man's freedom
of action for ten minutes ! So far she had carried
things — but to what end? Why, to sit down and
eat breakfast, while the opportunity escaped. She
had the sense in every nerve of his walking into the
trap which she had prepared for him. At moments
it seemed quite probable that she should be suddenly
haled out somewhere and compelled to reaffirm the
ruinous admission she had made to Winthrop, while
Emmet was dragged away to some everlasting dis-
grace. She detained the waiter, got a card from her
purse, and scribbled : " Let me see you a moment
in the parlor at once — please."

" I 'd like to see Mr. Emmet a minute, before he
gets away," she explained to Mrs. Randall, trying
as hard as she could to keep her voice quite steady.
She thought it sounded a little faint, and a wave of
color came over her face.

" I should have done no such thing, Helen," said
Mrs. Randall, with an addition to her injuries.
''It's quite useless. Mr. Winthrop is going to ar-
range a conference for me after breakfast. If Mr.
Emmet chooses to come, very well. Be sure the
chops are hot," she added, for the waiter had
returned.

The minutes dragged interminably. A boy of
many brass buttons, bearing a tiny tray, came into
the dining-room. Miss Page's heart missed a beat
or so. The boy inquired of the usher; was wafted

158

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

in her direction. She remembered to try to look
calm. He was at her side. Her own card lay on the
tray. " Mr. Emmet ain't in his room," said the boy.

She attempted to sip the coffee, which seemed
likely to choke her.

" I '11 wait for you upstairs," she said, reckless
of the chin, and, without looking around, arose and
walked from the room.

The dining-room was on the ground-floor. She
walked deliberately by the elevator on one side and
the stairway on the other into the hotel office, where
she drew the eyes of a dozen lounging men. There
was a little smoking and writing room off to the left.
She walked coolly and with a negligent ease through
the office to the front windows that gave upon the
street, looked out a moment, and calmly sauntered
back. Going and coming, she threw a swift glance
over the writing-room. But she saw no one she
knew.

The elevator boy leaned against the wire lattice
by the open door of the cage. She stepped in.
The boy followed and started the machine. " Par-
lor floor," she said, and they stopped at the first
landing. The lock of the wire door did not yield
at the first pressure of the boy's fingers.

"They been goin' to have this door fixed for a
week : goin' to put in a automatic opener ; guess it
needs it," the boy explained sociably.

The sociability made its instant appeal to her
suffering nerves. There was no one else in sight.

159

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

"Is Mr. Emmet on this floor?" she asked. To
get the lay of the land would be something.

" Mr. Emmet ? No 'm ; on the fourth floor ;
number four twenty-one." The boy had begun to
close the door of the cage when she spoke, and
was turning the lever of the machine. Now he
brought the lever back, and held the door open as
though he were uncertain whether she would get in
again.

" Oh, I was mistaken," she said without the least
hesitation, and stepped into the cage. She did not
know why. She did not know whether the boy
would take her up to the fourth floor or down again.
The cage started up. It occurred to her that she
had quite lost her head and was doing something
dreadful. But that did not seem to matter much.

"Straight ahead to first corridor on your right;
about halfway down ; number four twenty-one,"
said the boy.

" Thank you," said Miss Page, as she stepped out,
and the cage disappeared.

A pier mirror stood in the wide hall before the
elevator landing. In the glass she saw a tall young
woman with her own face, except that there was no
color in it. The empty corridors stretched before
her. She dared not go a step further. Already she
had thrown away her dignity and self-respect. She
felt herself standing miserable and useless at the last
brink. She simply waited in a kind of agonized
helplessness.

1 60

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

This face and figure struck upon Emmet's eye as
he came dully along the corridor, his overcoat on his
arm. In the first moment it seemed not so remark-
able that she should be there, for a figure of this sort,
reserved, accusing, condemning, had been rising in
his thoughts through the night and morning. He
had even supposed that she would be coming down
there.

He came up. « I lost your bill," he said. "Pd
like to tell you how." When he took off his hat
his hair was seen to be rumpled. His face looked
a little haggard, which helped on the forlorn note in
his voice. Such was the effect of this forlornness
that Miss Page did not trust herself to speak. The
way his big hands hung limp at his sides took away
her voice for the moment. She only nodded.

"I let Gallagher give me an interest in a concern
called the Metropolitan Electric Company," he said.
" It was n't an honest concern, and I knew it, but
I didn't care much then. We pretended that my
interest was to pay for my legal services. There
was n't any prearrangement about this Consolidation
Bill, for that was before I was elected ; and I had
done some little legal work for the company, and we
were all good fellows together."

He had been trying most of the night and morn-
ing to arrange the order of his speech; but he had
not been able to do it. Now, unconsciously, he
took up the simple facts as they had been in his
mind.

i6i

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

"John just thought I was a good fellow, and he
handed over the stock, and I took it because he was
a good fellow. Then he got me into the chairman-
ship, and when this Consolidation Bill came up he
had it referred to my committee, because he 'd been
a good fellow to me, and I was to be a good fellow
to him. He wanted to make Winthrop buy out
the Metropolitan, as a consideration for letting the
Consolidation Bill go through. Well, finally, I
wanted to get out of this electric business, which I
did n't like any more. I tried to arrange a com-
promise between Gallagher and Winthrop, to get
it out of the way, and John and I fell out about it.
Then he upset your bill, just to remind me that
he was the boss. At first I was simply in a rage.
It stung my pride. I told him I 'd denounce the
Electric Bill, because I wanted to hurt him any way
I could. But that 's all gone now, and I 'm going
to do it because it 's the truth. John has been the
boss. The dishonesty has been all around me and
all through me ; and I want to tell about it just as
it is. Of course, I know it won't do any particular
good, — at least not now. It is n't for the public.
It 's for myself. Everybody knows what the con-
ditions are, I guess ; and everybody seems to tolerate
them. But it's — spoiled everything for me. And
I want to say my say about it — some people will
understand it, maybe, and then I '11 drop it all — go
away somewhere else, I suppose. For the untruth
has ruined me. Nothing can alter that."

162

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

" I don't think it 's ruined you at all," she pro-
tested, with a passion which, perhaps, was a little
petulant. As he had gone on speaking, she had felt
in a blind, wounded, accusing way that he was
cutting all the ground from under her feet. Her
own drama seemed to be left dangling in mid-air.
"Why should you give up — anything?" she de-
manded. Suddenly she felt her eyes smarting.

He started a little toward her. " If I thought
you cared ! " — He stopped abruptly, as though
ashamed of the touch of impetuosity. His advancing
hands fell helplessly against his side.

" If I cared ! " she flashed at him — then, with
a quick imploring: "Oh, don't be a miserable
MAN ! If I had n't cared, would I have followed
you to Springfield and come up — almost to your
room — "

" Helen ! Helen ! " — warnlngly, under his breath.

" No, sir ! " she stepped back from the inviting
hand. "I'm going to tell you. I told Winthrop
and Gallagher what you said about getting somebody
to settle the Electric Bill — not thinking it would
hurt you ; and they were going to use it against
you if you made your speech, or Winthrop was, for
I think Gallagher is your friend, anyway. And do
you think I could endure that ? I came down here
to tell you about it. Do stop now ; I can't back
through the wall. You are a miserable man !
Oh ! " Since retreat was now impossible, she sud-
denly leaned a little closer, threw up her chin,

163

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

which brought her face near to his. " You know
I could n't endure that I should be the one to hurt
you. I was n't ready to let it all go — to see you
hurt your career. I was n't ready to sacrifice my
career — for truth or anything else. What 's truth,
anyway ? "

" Truth ? Why, I guess it 's you ! " said Emmet.
He would have said more, fatuously, but she stopped
him.

"We must go downstairs," she said with a kind
of fond refusal ; " they '11 be expecting me."

Down in Parlor C, Johnny Gallagher leaned
over the back of a chair and glowered at Prescott
and Winthrop before him. Mrs. Randall sat a
little apart, and her double chin seemed to defy him
to impeach its respectability.

" Behave yourself now ! " Helen whispered
warningly. They had come through Parlor D, and
were at the open door.

" Let 's be frank and friendly all around," — it
was Johnny's strident voice, — " and acknowledge
that we 're all brother pirates on the make, and not
try to backcap each other's games. What 's the
difference between rigging the legislature and rigging
the stock market ? I '11 admit I 'm a pirate. But
who 's going to cast the first stone at me ? Who 's
going to say that politics ought to be better than
other business ? Other things being as they are in
this world, what 's the matter with my running my
politics the way I do ? "

164

'HO-ftAi jP^^m-'

"-'1'// admit I'm a pirate. But who's going to cast the
first stofie at me /* ' "

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

The answer came from the door.

" You would n't tell your wife what you do,
Johnny," said Emmet. He was beaming in his
most sparkling manner.

Johnny stared a moment. "Well, who'd want
to tell his wife ? " he demanded.

"Why, I would," Emmet declared, and laughed
shamelessly.

Miss Page looked demurely at the floor, and took
a bit of her lip between her teeth, and colored.

For a mere instant Gallagher floundered. Then
he walked over and confronted the two, his mouth
shut, his eyes twinkling. After he had surveyed
them an instant, he looked around at the others.

"The babes in the woods," he said solemnly.
" You can't never beat 'em ! A barbed-wire fence
would n't keep 'em apart ! " He stepped up to
Miss Page. " But why did n't you tell me ? " he
said. " It would have saved all the trouble. I
tried to get you to."

She bent a little toward him, quickly, eagerly.
" I thought once or twice you did, too," she ex-
claimed. "But then — well!" As though the
inflections explained everything.

" The babes in the woods," he repeated solemnly.
" What about your speech, Dan ? " he added
abruptly.

" Speech ! " Emmet repeated in a tone of surprise.
He glanced at Helen in a confused way. "Why
— the speech — " he seemed bewildered for a mo-

■65

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

ment. Then he looked around in a kind of happy
dubiety. "Why, I guess I've made the speech
already."

" I guess you have," said Helen.

Emmet seemed still somewhat confused. " It 's
all wrong, John," he declared, with a doubtful
shake of his head at Gallagher. "It's thoroughly
wrong. But — well — I seem to have got human-
ized sort of — maybe a fellow has to be rather un-
happy before he can take a severe view of things.
It would n't be right some way for me to pitch into
anybody when I was so happy myself. I suppose if
we were n't such good fellows we would n't tolerate
so much badness. I 'm out of it now, you know,
and I '11 just stay out and say no more about it."

" Well," said Johnny, philosophically, " I reckon
you '11 have troubles enough of your own, if you 're
going to get married."

" Oh ! " Miss Page protested — plainly at the
implication of marriage, so that every one laughed
at her, and Mrs. Randall, who had come over that
way, with a mollified chin, put her hand in a
motherly way on the young woman's arm. They
got out of the room, followed by Emmet.

There was a pause, full of the mellow, friendly
air.

" This falling in love — " said Johnny, thought-
fully. " Still," he added, after an instant, looking
at Winthrop and Prescott whimsically, " I suppose
we men 'd get too tough to live if it was n't for

i66

THE CHAIRMAN'S POLITICS

that." Again there was a little smiling pause.
" Well," said Johnny, good-naturedly, " it seems
kind of a pity to go on with the scrap after this.
The innocents being out of it, suppose we sinful
gents get down to business. I '11 be reasonable
with you."

167

THE LAME BOT

rHE LAME BOY

LATHAM was about to take the aisle seat ;
but he remembered his wife and stood
aside, smiling a good-natured confession
of his absent-mindedness.
When they were seated, Mrs. Latham said, " How
did you come to think of me ? " She looked up at
him, her eyes shining over the joke of his abstraction.
The man smiled again, but more vaguely. A
light reply occurred to him ; but his thoughts were
running too strongly back to the absorbing coil of
that problem which he had left, evidenced by a wide
litter of papers and law books on his study table.

He was well enough aware of the scene, — the
theatre-like hall, the stage in front prodigally framed
in flowers, the people filling the seats about. He
nodded here and there, and he was aware that other
people glanced at him.

His face was easily recognized even from those
variously caricaturing portraits which appeared in
the newspapers from time to time. The short sandy
hair, inclining from each side, ran together in a sort
of snarl above the centre of his broad, sloping,

171

THE LAME BOY

aggressive brow. This odd snarl was repeated in
miniature in the meeting of his heavy eyebrows.
The eyes themselves looked dim behind the gold-
bowed glasses. From each side of his wide, blunt
nose a deep furrow ran down, and a welt of tough
colorless flesh lay over the furrow. The mouth
was rather small ; the chin square, with a cleft in
the middle. His strong, well-made hands lay one
on each arm of the seat. Mrs. Latham dropped
her wrist across the hand which monopolized the
arm between their seats, and instantly drew it away,
leaning a little to the other side so as not to disturb
him. Latham was trying to recall the precise
language of that decision in the 3 2d Illinois, —
a bore to be away from one's books. But he again
supposed, in an undercurrent consciousness, that a
Commencement was an affair demanding some
sacrifice, if one had a son.

Music began, and banished the slight, superficial
annoyance of the stirring and chattering about him.
He approved of music. It made a good atmosphere
to think in. Some other affairs went forward on
the stage, to which he gave at moments a cursory
attention.

Ah, the boy ! Latham made a strong winking
with both eyes. His big frame slid further down in
the seat. He softly laid the tips of his fingers to-
gether. He was ready to listen.

A slight lad, about eighteen, was coming to the
front of the stage, walking with a distinct limp.

172

*r':^^

^H«f^^ Foe-AO.T>r

A moment zvheji youth should be triumpha?Jt

THE LAME BOY

Abruptly, quite unexpectedly, a dull pang touched
Latham's heart. Such a misfortune to be lame in
youth !

The boy*s stifF leg had always been a sorrow,
naturally ; but for years a familiar, accepted sorrow,
like a death that had happened long ago. Now, as
the slender young figure stood forth so conspicuously
in a moment when youth should be triumphant —
Oddly, Latham recalled the girl who had lately stood
there singing ; even out of his mental remoteness
there emanated a sense of the joy of her young,
vigorous, beautiful limbs, like a perfume remembered
after it has passed. His boy*s lameness became
vitally of the present. There were his own huge,
tireless limbs, his own bodily vigor that was equal
to anything. He felt an impotent, pitying wish to
give the boy a fairer endowment. Another thing
struck him with new force, — it was the mother's
face up there.

The lad was speaking. His subject was The
Duties of Citizenship. Latham had smiled over it
vaguely when his wife told him.

At first, as he listened, there was a slight move-
ment of his lips, like the beginning of a smile. But
very soon that ceased, and slowly, step by step, a
large wonder took possession of him.

This essay was callow enough in the main, sopho-
morical enough, romantic enough. Latham knew
that he could blow the thing over with a breath,
that he could riddle it with a gibe, that a movement

173

THE LAME BOY

of his finger would be enough to shatter it. But he
was not thinking of that. The emotion in his mind
amounted to this: Where had the boy come by
those thoughts ? This boy, who half an hour before
had seemed so familiar, as thoroughly imbedded in
the intimate environment of his life as the chair in
his study, in respect of whom his indefinite and un-
formulated impression had been that he could draw
his finger around the whole circumference of the
younger existence, — by what miracle had he sud-
denly developed the universe of an independent
mind ?

For there was thought here. The lawyer's mind,
without conscious analysis, recognized the indepen-
dent intellectual force. Much was taken at second
hand, much was false, much was flimsy; but the
boy had thought. The father perceived, with ex-
treme surprise, that the son had been standing apart
in his individuality, trying, considering, pondering.
Latham sympathetically translated himself to the
lad's place. He understood that this speaker had
been weighing and judging his father, and his father's
world.

It occurred to Latham that he must have known
this would happen, — but only " some time," a time
far off^. Again he felt a kind of immense pity.
He had always proposed vaguely to do what he
could about forming the boy's mind ; and behold !
while he slept the forming had taken place.

It touched his affection, and at the same time,

174

THE LAME BOY

indistinctly, it stirred a self-pity in him, as though
he had irreparably lost something. He looked
around at his wife, moving his hand a little to touch
her arm with an unwonted softness. But at the
first light contact she drew her arm away, and bent
a Httle further to the other side, just as she had at
first when her arm disturbed his hand. Instantly,
in the play of new-wrought emotion, Latham saw
that this was simply her habitual, long-schooled,
sweet sacrifice to the inexorable demands of his pre-
occupation. Then he saw her face more fully, and
his hand slipped back from the arm of the seat. In a
queer flash he felt a fear of disturbing her.

She sat well forward. Her rapt face was fixed
upon the speaking boy so intently that she seemed to
have entered into his being, to be speaking with him.
It was in a way the boy's face, with its soft dark
eyes, short straight nose, and gentle mouth and chin,
— still a well-preserved, pretty face, its comeliness
dignified by the slight powdering of gray in the
smooth brown hair. Her hands rested in her lap.
Now and then they stirred with a slight unconscious
nervous motion. Her lips, too, moved a little now
and then. In a moment Latham perceived that she
was in fact speaking with the boy. It came to him
with sudden insight how the boy had often gone to
her with this essay ; how she had read and listened
to it ; how she had absorbed it as a part of his life.
The words from the stage failed to impress him as
he hung on this new wonder.

175

THE LAME BOY

Soon he saw something else, — that it was the
moment of the woman's tenderest and completest
triumph. She had heard him speak a few times.
He had humored her wish with good-natured toler-
ance. But now he knew that nothing he could do
would ever move her as this boy's speech did.
Though he should lay a new corner-stone of law or
compel a senate, her heart would not be suffused
with this tender exultation. He felt strangely lonely.

Getting into the carriage, he wished to sit by his
wife, to feel her beside him, to touch her. But
she and the lad took the back seat as a matter of
course. He had already patted the boy's shoulder
and mumbled something about the essay. As the
carriage wheeled around, the boy said, with a kind
of gentle boldness, " Did n't you like Rose's sing-
ing, father ? "

" Yes," replied Latham absently, engrossed in
his surprises. At once the mother and son fell to
talking together in low tones. It wounded the
man, although he knew well enough it was his own
work.

When they entered the house, Latham went at
once stolidly up the ample curving stairs, while the
other two loitered in the hall. On the second floor
he mechanically pushed through the door to his
study, turned on the electric lights, and sat down in
the big leather-covered chair before the long table,
covered with its professional litter, from which he
had torn himself reluctantly. His wife had appeared

176

THE LAME BOY

at the door putting on her gloves, and said, " It 's
time now, Edward," and he had got up quickly, for
she always gave him the last second.

Now-, as he looked down at the pile of papers
and the opened books, a singular repugnance filled
his mind. How long he had toiled at those things !
How many days !

He had succeeded. The house was spacious.
There was money enough. His name was a host.
But at this moment he felt a kind of disgust, a
kind of anger, toward that admirable mind of
his ; that splendid, tireless, insatiable machine, which
wrought ceaselessly day and night, and ground
up his life. He was lonely. He got up and
stepped to the small secretary in the corner. He
explored a little drawer, then another, and drew
out a yellow cabinet photograph of his wife, taken
in the year they were married. It came to him
just how she used to sit at the piano and play lightly
and sing softly to herself in the evening, while he
pored over his law books. There was not this
spaciousness in their appointments then. He was
just struggling up to his first small successes. He
had not looked at this photograph for years.

Where had those years gone ? He could count
them in lawsuits fought, in fees won. They were
written deep in those yellow-backed books about him.
But he was getting old. He was old. His son
had grown up unawares. His own wife, — how
had that sprinkling of gray come into her hair,
la 177

THE LAME BOY

when it was only yesterday that she was like this

picture ?

Suddenly that solid world of affairs in which he
had lived seemed phantasmagorial, hollow, a dream
in which somehow he had lost his life. For the
better part of it was lost. Soon he would be bent,
decrepit, joy would be forever behind him.

He slipped the photograph into his inner coat-
pocket. He turned to the door with a kind of
anxious despair, as though he felt the strength
going out of his rugged limbs, as though he felt age
overwhelming him. He wished most of all to take
his wife's hand, to sit beside her, to feel himself
again loving and beloved, to warm away the frost
that touched his heart.

He crossed the hall, pushed open the door of his
wife's room, and hesitated on the threshold. The
boy sat beside his mother. They were talking
together.

The son's presence was a shock. Somehow, to
Latham's perception, that presence made his own
simple, ardent outflowing of tenderness half gro-
tesque, half silly, as though the lad had caught him in
something unseemly. He felt embarrassed, almost
sheepish.

The mother and son had stopped talking the
moment he appeared. The woman looked up at
him, serene, gentle, loyal, half ready to rise, expect-
ing that he would ask for something.

Latham pulled a chair over, and sat down before

178

THE LAME BOY

them. He wished to say: "I am very lonely; go
on talking; let me hear what it is that you always
have to say to each other." But what he did say
was : " I thought I 'd come in and see how the '
young orator felt after his effort." He spoke
smilingly ; but the words struck him as patronizing,
as possibly suggesting a sarcasm.

The boy glanced down. The mother looked at
him fondly. " He feels very well, I guess," she
said. Her hand brushed the hair back from his
forehead.

The boy turned with a shy eagerness. " Did you
think I was right, father ? "

Latham smiled tolerantly, and replied at once :
" Oh, bless you, no. You were quite wrong. But
you spoke very well, and it was fairly original.
That is the main thing at your age."

The lad's eyes fell quickly. He put his hand, as
by an unconscious motion, to the arm of his mother's
chair. She put her hand over it caressingly.

Then Latham saw that he had hurt the boy;
that the youth's thought was as precious to him as
the man's to him. This perception wounded him.
" Why can they not understand me ? " he asked
himself bitterly, half resentfully.

" I thought it was very good, Edward," said the
mother, more to the lad than to him ; and com-
fortingly, not contentiously.

Latham saw again how close they were to each
other. It came to him that if she no longer played

179

THE LAME BOY

and sung to herself softly, it was because the boy
had filled up her life. Long ago she had been lonely
many a time, just as he was to-night. But the
human nature in her had taken its perfect revenge.
The boy was all she required. The husband was
left to the preoccupations on which he had insisted.
" Very likely it was altogether good. I am apt
to be mistaken — about many things," said Latham.
He felt that he spoke dryly, even that it sounded
somewhat bitter. His wife looked at him with a
faint surprise. There was a brief, awkward pause.
Something else came to his lips ; but it was not
the right thing. He sat a moment, embarrassed,
helpless.

" Have you finished your work so early ? " Mrs.
Latham asked.

He felt it to be simply a politeness, — the sort of
speech that one makes when nothing else comes to
one.

" No, I have more to do," he answered, and he
rose from his chair.

For an instant the woman glanced up at him.
The momentary sense of a loss, of an affectionate
desire, stirred in her. But he had taken one look
at her, and was turning away. It was the law of
their lives. She said nothing.

It had come to Latham that, after all, he had
nothing to say to these dear strangers in his house.
His thought and their thought were a world apart,
and he had lost the trick of interpretation, — lost it

I So

THE LAME BOY

somehow in those years of intense application that
had worn his mind in grooves, so that, however
well it went along its own path, a distraction had
come to be painful to him.

He took his loneliness back to his den. His will
was set now, and he bent grimly over his task.

Two hours later he stood up, wiping his glasses.
He was tired, but content. The brief lay outlined
before him. He knew the men were few who could
have done it so well and so quickly. The old mill
ground !

He touched something in his pocket, and drew
out his wife's picture. He smiled over it a little
mournfully, but without any bitterness. His manner
of life was fixed. He was Latham. A sense of
his capacity, of his power, stirred in him. He felt
the solid structure of his success. Thank God, at
any rate, he had made an enduring rock, in the
shadow of which their lives were secure. Let him
be the rock. There were not too many of them.

i8i

VI
THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

THE SALT CROWD'S
TRADE

BURT, WESTLAKE & CO., brokers,
were at last settled in their offices on
the ground-floor of the La Salle Building.
All was conspicuously new. The rough-
hewn surfaces of the craggy granite which formed
the two lower stories of the building glistened clean
and hard in the sun. The broad cement flagging
outside dazzled one's eyes. The twelve upper
stories of bufF terra-cotta fronted the dingy street in
dandified newness. Time had put no speck or nick
in the white marbles of the rotunda. The brass
grills which enclosed the elevator shafts were as
sharp as fresh-minted coins.

A side door, convenient for bashful speculators,
opened from the rotunda to the broker's offices,
which had a front door on La Salle Street. The
rosewood, plate-glass, and cream-tinted walls of the
offices were in pristine freshness. In the big back
room where the customers of the house lounged and

185

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

watched quotations, the tall blackboards presented
an even deadness of unworn funereal surface. In
the small room at the front, sacred to the heads of
the house and to weighty business, the rugs, tables,
and chairs were almost too new to use.

Nevertheless the partners were not altogether
happy. The firm had started modestly three years
before in the upper story of a second-rate building.
It had prospered. But this new lavish setting
meant an expense account often thousand dollars a
year, including the private wire to New York, and
there was fifty thousand dollars for the membership
in the New York Stock Exchange. The market
had not picked up very fast after the slump of the
spring. Trade, in fact, was dull — and the expense
account was active.

Hartley Burt, the senior partner, sat on a table in
the front room. He was a young man of large and
full figure, — fat, some people called him. The
heavy lids, drooping over black eyes, gave his broad,
florid, large-featured face an odd cast. Westlake,
of Burt's own age, lounged, sprawling, in one of the
new chairs, and lifted a large foot comfortably to
the seat of another. A Derby hat was thrust back
on his partly bald head. He was smoking and star-
ing out of the window at the passing show.

" Dull ; yes, you bet," he said, without moving
his eyes. " If it don't pick up pretty soon, I guess
we '11 be what Shakespeare called up against the real
thing."

1 86

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

" Pshaw ! It '11 pick up," said Burt, confidently.
" Blast it, it 's got to pick up ! We need the
money." He laughed, in a quiet, deep-toned
way.

" It would be an outrage to shut up as fine an
office as this just because we could n't pay the rent
on it," said Westlake, and laughed too.

" It pinches a little up at the house," the senior
partner confessed, soberly. " We ought to get hold
of some of that Salt crowd's trade."

The offices of the Illinois Coal and Iron Com-
pany occupied all of the thirteenth and fourteenth
stories of the La Salle Building, — a fact which the
partners had more or less in mind when they finally
closed the contract for the expensive ground-floor
rooms. Henry Salt, President of the Coal and Iron
Company, walked by their side door every day,
going to and from the elevators. And if they could
get even a little of the stock trade of Henry Salt and
his personal followers they would not need to worry
over the ten thousand dollars a year. Salt dealt in
stocks by the ream. The commissions on his busi-
ness would take care of the expense account.

" That *s a fact. We ought to get some of it,"
said Westlake. " The old man looked in at the
door this morning. He said, ' You 've got good
offices. Is it going to rain ? ' I said, ' No, I guess
it won't rain.' If we don't get his business after
that, he 's a lobster." The junior partner spread his
face in an appreciative grin.

187

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

" If we don't get his trade," said Burt, with his
deep-toned laugh, " we '11 send him a bill for looking
in."

" Sure ! " Westlake crowed. " Henry Salt, debtor,
to one expert opinion on the weather, a thousand
dollars ! "

"We'll get him some day," Burt declared, with
quiet assurance. " We '11 be in a position to do
him a favor some day ; to tell him something he
wants to know, and after that it will be clear sail-
ing. The old goat ! C. I. is pretty soft just now.
Wonder what 's up."

" Say, that reminds me. There 's a suit of some
sort pending against 'em — something about that
Fox Valley deal, is n't there ? I remember some-
thing about it. Dixon was saying to-day that there
was going to be a decision pretty soon, and that's
what 's making the stock weak."

" Yes, there is a suit. Let 's see." Burt turned
to the filing case on top of his desk. " Oh, yes.
That fellow Bynum, don't you remember ? Bynum
had two hundred shares of Fox Valley Iron Works
stock. Salt bought up the rest of the stock, but
Bynum would n't sell. Then Salt leased the Fox
Valley to the Coal and Iron Company, and after
a while Bynum brought suit, — claimed the Coal
and Iron Company was a trust, a combination in
restraint of trade under the Illinois law, and asked
to have the lease set aside. I remember it now.
The Circuit Court found against Bynum, and he

i88

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

took the case to the Appellate Court. A decision
coming, you say ? "

" So Dixon says. Wonder if it 's Judge Martin ?
If it is, we might go up there to dinner and chloro-
form the judge and get the decision, and hand it
over to Salt on a contract that he 'd give us half his
stock trade."

They laughed over this, in the way of men inured
to chance, who cannot stay downcast very long.

"Wanted — recipe to catch Salt. Do you put
a bird on his tail ? " said Burt, and they parted,
laughing.

At half-past one Henry Salt, walking back from
lunch through the rain, made a wet trail across the
white marble floor of the rotunda. A car was
ready for the ascent. The starter had given the
signal and the door was closing. The starter
caught sight of this dripping figure and whirled
back and caught the closing door, with a gesture
to the conductor to hold the car. But the presi-
dent of C. I. turned calmly aside and walked to
the door of Burt, Westlake & Co.'s back room.
He could see the figures on the blackboard from
the door. Of the seven men lounging in the room,
five were instantly aware that Salt stood in the
door. Hartley Burt was one of the five. He
nodded, smiling slightly, and for the sake of his
dignity, took time to measure the figure in the

189

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

doorway, — a broad, bulky, high-shouldered figure,
indifferently dressed, rain dripping from the brim
of his soft hat upon his wet, unprotected shoulders.

Salt took off his hat, mechanically, and shook the
water from the brim. His stiff, close-clipped, yel-
low hair was slightly sprinkled with gray. There
were wrinkles in his broad face. But as he stood,
heavy and bull-like, looking over at the blackboard,
he gave the impression of inexhaustible vitality.

Burt walked across the room in a leisurely way.
He carried himself well, with his chin up.

" Why did n't you stop in and borrow an um-
brella ? I 'd have lent you one," he said as he
came before Salt.

The president of C. I. grinned a very little.
"Market's dull, eh?" he said.

" Yes, — dull and soft. The crowd seems mostly
bearish — rather sell than buy."

"What's C. I. there? Hundred and eight?"
Salt asked.

Burt glanced back at the board. "Yes, hundred
and eight — two points down from the opening.
A good many people seem to be selling it. Afraid
of the court decision, I suppose."

" Well, I don't know but I '11 sell some myself,"
said Salt, meditatively.

The broker waited, his heavy-lidded black eyes
on the magnate's face. Was Salt going to give
him an order ? Two words now would settle that
expense account.

190

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

" Can't keep a stock up if every court is going to
take a fall out of the company," Salt grumbled.

"You won in the lower court," Burt suggested.

"Yes. And we ought to win now. But a
court is uncertain. Wish I knew what this one
was going to do." The slight grin reappeared.
" I 'd know then whether to sell or buy. You 've
got good offices."

Salt turned calmly and made for the elevators with
his vigorous waddle. The saving two words were
not spoken. Burt loitered a moment glancing after
the bull-like, wet, indifferently dressed figure, and
as he looked, the lust to succeed stiffened his will.
" All the same I '11 get you some day," he thought.

He was turning back to the blackboard when the
young woman who sat by the door of the private
room and did their typewriting, glided up.

"Mr. Martin — Judge Martin's son — is in your
room. He wishes to see you right away," she said,
in an aside.

Burt entered the front room holding out his hand,
saying, " Hello, Eddie."

The young man within sprang up in nervous
haste and seized the extended hand. "Say, old man,
I want to see you," he began excitedly.

There was a certain suspense, and aloofness in
Burt's manner as he stood before his caller measur-
ing him with steady, deliberate eyes. He had the
advantage of five years' seniority and of the solid
character as opposed to the light one. Most of all

191

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

he had the advantage which the presentable reputa-
tion holds over the unpresentable one. This young
man was slender, graceful, and dressed like a dandy.
His complexion was fair as a girl's j his blue eyes
looked frank and merry ; his lips were always ready
to laugh, and there was no sign anywhere of the in-
curable scapegrace which every one knew him for.

"What is it, Eddie?" said the broker, steadily.

" It 's straight business ! " The blue eyes flashed
out a laugh. " I 've scraped some money together

— forty-eight hundred dollars in real money ; no
stage greenbacks this time." He would have his
joke on himself even amid his evident excitement.
" I want you to take that for margin, and sell five
hundred shares of Illinois Coal and Iron for me.
Can you ? "

"Yes. I can sell It for you," said Burt, secretly
surprised at so fair a proposition from Eddie.

" Good ! Say, do it right now, will you ? The
market 's closing."

Burt stepped to the door and spoke to the sten-
ographer.

•' You '11 probably lose your money, Eddie," he
said coolly, as he turned back to the young man.

" Not on your life ! Say, old man, it's a cinch ! "
The caller's excitement visibly rose. It shone in
his eyes. " See here, now." He edged close to
Burt, speaking rapidly. "You know there's a suit
pending against the company in the Appellate Court

— fellow named Bynum said it was a trust and all

192

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

that." Burt nodded. " Well, the old man 's writing
the decision in that case. He 's doing it at home.
I was rummaging through his desk little while ago,
looking for a letter of mine he 'd collared — what
you might call an incriminating document. Oh,
he's a regular pirate when it comes to collaring my
things ! Well, I ran across a draft of the decision.
Say, it 's a Joe dandy ! Court takes a fall out of
C. I. at every turn. Sets aside that lease of the Fox
Valley plant ; holds that the company is a trust, an
illegal combination in restraint of trade. It 's done
in the old man's best manner ; same one he uses on
me about twice a week. Quotes the law and the
decisions ; makes a grand spiel about the duty of
courts to enforce the statutes ; says the attorney-gen-
eral ought to proceed against the company and take
away its charter ; asks why the Grand Jury does n't
indict the managers under the criminal section of
the anti-trust act. Oh, it 's a peacherino ! Say, that
ought to knock C. I. off ten, fifteen points, ought n't
it ? "

" Maybe," said Burt, dully.

" Well, then, what do you say ? Suppose we
make that order a thousand shares instead of five
hundred. I need some money infernally, old man."

" Better let it be at five hundred, Eddie. That 's
less than ten points margin."

" Well, of course, if you say so," said Martin,
reluctantly, and with a lingering hope. " But, see
here, why don't you jump in and get short of a lot
13 193

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

of C. I. yourself? Make all the money you can
out of it, old man. I 'm willing ! " The blue eyes
and red lips flashed an engaging smile.

When Burt got back to the rear room he saw,
with relief, that the market had closed. The loung-
ing customers who wore out his new chairs so
liberally and traded so meagrely were gone. He
heard Westlake asking for him in the middle room,
aind heard one of the clerks say that he had gone out.
He did not contradict it. He knew then — it was
about the first thing he did definitely know — that
he was not going to tell Westlake what he had just
heard. Whatever was done he was going to do it
alone. This decision to do it himself was not in
any degree premeditated. It was simply the leading
of an instinctive sense.

In this game of speculation all was as fair as
in love or war. The only thing was to win. In-
formation gained, no matter how, was part of the
game. Without an instant's consideration, Burt
knew that if Westlake had foreknowledge of the
court's decision he would sell C. I., and tell his
friends to sell it, and be no more troubled by a
scruple than would a general who took advantage
of the enemy's secret. That was part of the game.
Burt's ambition was to be a successful broker, to
build up a great house, to attract big operators —
and, just now, to overcome that ominous expense
account. Eddie Martin's disclosure presented itself
to his mind, not so much as a " tip " for a specu-

194

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

lation of his own, as a bait to catch Henry Salt
with. If he gave Salt this information, Salt would
give him some trade. That was the bigger game.
If the information had come to him in a little dif-
ferent way his course would have been perfectly
plain ; he would have told Salt, and he would have
had no qualms about it. But a personal equation
confused his play.

He knew Judge Martin and honored him as a
sincere and upright man. He knew Judge Martin's
wife and liked her. Judge Martin's daughter was
his own wife's friend. She came rather often to
his place in Edgewater. Some way a picture of
her, close beside Rachel in the cool of his veranda,
on his small, shady lawn, or upstairs in Rachel's
room, persisted in his mind and confused his play.
Rachel and the babies got mixed up in it. He
sat staring at the blackboard, slowly smoking, not
really thinking at all, but turning around in his
labyrinth.

At three o'clock he got up. He wanted both
to go home and to go anywhere but home. While
he stood, undecided, Henry Salt stepped out of an
elevator and started to the street with his strong,
awkward gait.

This burly figure abruptly dramatized the diffi-
culty. It was Opportunity personified. How very
easy it was ! The simplest matter of walking
rapidly across the rotunda and speaking half a
dozen words under his breath. Opportunity and

195

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

Success were passing his door. He felt a kind of
rage against his scruples, as though he had been
unjustly caught in some silly sort of trap. It was
a man's game, after all ! The strong fighting blood
came up into his brain. To rush forward, tramp-
ling over the small things in one's way; to seize
success, grapple with it, win it ! At bottom the
man who lacked the courage to do that never
deserved success ! All this stirred hotly in his
mind. Yet he stood there, motionless, while
Salt disappeared.

His place in Edgewater was modest enough, —
a two-story red brick house with white blinds and
a wide white porch, a foot above the ground level,
on two sides. The abundant vines and the oak-
trees about it, and the little thicket of shrubbery on
the trim lawn, gave a secluded and country-like
effect. Burt was rather proud of the place. He
was proud of his wife. She came up to the porch
from the lawn, in a dainty linen suit, the chubby
little girl, and the chubbier littler boy clinging to
her skirts and clamoring with infantile mirth. She
sat down in the willow rocker beside Burt.

" How good the early summer evenings are ! "
she said, with a full content.

Burt noticed again her beautiful white hands, one
of which rested on the arm of his chair. Suddenly
he thought, " Her hands are beautiful ; mine are
strong. It 's her part to have sweetness ; mine to
have force. I 'd be doing better to go out and win

196

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

for her in a man's way, rather than try to have her
gentle qualities. What am I hesitating about ? "

He took the hand which lay on the arm of his
chair, beautifully shaped, white, smooth as velvet
to the touch, with pink nails. The pretty, soft
fingers closed lightly over his broad, hard palm,
and a singular power came from them, — some-
thing indescribable which yet compelled him. An
odd thrill touched his heart. He felt that he must
do right.

Ill

C. I. opened at 107J, moved up ^, looked dull
almost to the point of lifelessness. The market,
on the whole, seemed a trifle stronger and more
active.

Burt read this much from the figures on the
blackboard. The house had not a single trade to
make that morning. Westlake was a bit glum.

About eleven o'clock Eddie Martin hurried in.
Jim (Jim Riner, his cousin and pal) had scraped
up twenty-seven hundred dollars, and wanted to
sell five hundred shares of C. I. Would Burt do
it for him ? They 'd make it a joint account be-
tween himself and Jim. There would be seventy-
five hundred dollars' margins on one thousand shares
— and it was a cinch, anyway. The old man was
working on the decision again last night. Had
Burt sold any stock for his own account ?

The broker accepted Jim's order to sell. He felt

197

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

an inexplicable helplessness to do otherwise. The
thing played back and forth in his own mind.
Maybe he was going to tell Salt. He could not
say that he was n't. The possibility kept dodging
about in his thought. He could say to himself
calmly, " It 's quite Hkely that I '11 give it away to
Salt to-day."

" He 's working on the decision, loading in more
ginger. I saw it again this morning," said Eddie,
excitedly, his eyes burning.

Unexpectedly Burt found himself seizing the
young man's arm in a tight grip.

" See here, Martin ! " (He had always called
him Eddie before.) " See here ! For Heaven's sake
keep your mouth shut about this ! Don't tell any-
body ! " He gave the arm a slight shake. " Don't
you see your father's position ? "

" Oh, that 's all right, old man ! That 's all
right ! " Eddie laughed nervously. " I won't go
around tipping it off. I 've only told you and Jim.
Blast the old man ! If he did n't treat me like a
beggar, I 'd have some consideration for him. But
I '11 keep mum — regular clam."

" C. I. 's soft as butter," said Westlake when
Burt went into the back room. The price was
drooping. It was not a break ; not a sharp, deci-
sive movement. The stock hung dully at 107^;
then slipped down to 107 ; presently there was a
sale at io6f. No further quotations came for
twenty minutes j then it was 106I, ^, 106. Then

198

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

the quotations stopped again. The whole market
had turned listless.

Burt was acutely aware of the approach of the
half-hour between one and two. The moment Salt
appeared in the doorway he knew it. He sauntered
over, carrying himself well, with his chin up ; but
his very blood tingled.

" Soft again, eh ? " said the fortune-maker.

"Soft," said Burt. " C. I. is down to 104."
His heavy-lidded eyes were on Salt's face, and he
had a strange sense of imparting the secret to him,
as a man about to stab might see the knife in the
wound before the blow was struck.

" Maybe somebody 's got a line on that decision.
Court may have tipped it off to some friends,'* Salt
suggested half jocularly. " I wish they'd tip it off
to me."

Burt was silent. How easy ! Merely to whisper
a word and the thing would be done. Even when
Salt turned away to the elevators the thing seemed
so near, so simple, — merely a motion of the eyelid,
the crook of a finger, the gentle pressure of a noise-
less trigger. But the thing was not done. When
Salt disappeared, the first thought in Burt's mind
was, " Maybe I '11 tell him to-morrow."

C. I. closed at loi. In the morning Eddie came
in early. There was seven points' profit on his
five hundred shares and six points on Jim's five
hundred. That would make them winners by sixty-
five hundred dollars if they closed the trade then.

199

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

But they did n't propose to close the trade with the
decision undelivered, and the decline in C. I. only
started. They wanted Burt to sell one thousand
shares more for their joint account on the strength
of their profit. That would make two thousand
shares in all that they would be short, and ten
points more on that, say, would exactly set them up
in business.

Again Burt accepted the order because he felt
helpless to refuse it. He and Eddie still potentially
stood together. Maybe he would tell Salt that day.
But again Salt came and went untold.

Saturday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, came
and passed. The market was getting stronger and
more active. But C. I. hung between par and loi
in a stubborn sort of way. Somebody seemed ready
to buy as much as was offered.

At 10.45 Thursday morning the electric printing
machine in Burt, Westlake & Co.'s back room ground
out this bulletin : " Appellate Court decides Illinois
Coal and Iron suit against the company." Ten
minutes later an amplified report began coming in.
The decision was sweeping, holding against the
company at every point, declaring it to be a trust,
illegal, in restraint of trade. There was a burst of
excitement along La Salle Street. C. I. was sold
right and left.

But the market was a puzzle. C. I. went off a
bare two points to 99. There it stuck. Every
share offered was promptly taken.

200

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

Friday morning C, I. opened at lOO. Ten
minutes later it was at 115. At the end of the first
half-hour's trading it was at 125. Then everybody
knew. The shorts were frantically trying to cover,
and the stock was cornered. Of course Salt had
cornered it. The Salt crowd had taken another
trick.

It happened that Burt was over at the bank when
the market opened. As he was coming out ten
minutes later, Westlake was running up the steps
wild-eyed. He clutched the senior partner's arm.

" Have you seen the market ? " he panted.
'*• Looks like a corner in C. L It was up to 108
when I left the office and climbing. We 're short
two thousand shares for young Martin and Riner."

Burt hurried back to the office in time to see the
boy set down the quotation T18 for Coal and Iron.
He stood looking at the figures. That extraordi-
nary confusion which had perplexed his mind for a
week was upon him now. Something paralyzed
the clarity and swiftness of decision upon which he
had prided himself. He felt himself inextricably
involved in a drama which was working itself
out beyond his volition. The only refuge of his
confused mind lay in doing nothing, as though
he had someway lost the power of independent
action.

" There '11 be a reaction from this advance. The
shorts are panic-stricken. It '11 go off again," he
said to Westlake. And he tried to comfort himself

201

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

with the words, although they sounded stupid even
to himself.

" Well," said Westlake, dubiously, but accepting
the senior partner's decision. He gave Burt an
odd look. The senior's broad face was composed
as usual. " Well," Westlake repeated, " if you say
so." His own face cleared. Burt usually knew
what he was about. At any rate a fellow must take
his chances as they came.

C. I. stopped at 125 simply because the shorts
stopped bidding for it. None was offered at less.
There was no doubt about the corner. Salt had all
the stock. The shorts could buy only on his
terms.

It was simple arithmetic for Burt, Westlake &
Co. They were short two thousand shares of C. I.,
on which, with the stock at 125, there was a loss
of forty-two thousand five hundred dollars. Against
this loss they held seventy-five hundred dollars in
margins. The idea of calling upon Eddie Martin
and Jim Riner for the difference was too ridiculous
to be considered. The stock would drop back,
Burt kept telling himself, to a point where the house
could get out with little or no loss.

But C. I. did not drop. After a ten-minute
lull the shorts began trying to cover. C. I. moved
up ten points j then fifteen, without a sale between
135 and 150, where it stood at eleven o'clock.

To the senior partner, sitting in the back room,
the thing had all the cruelty of a torture-chamber.

2Q2

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

That movement from 135 to 150 was like a sharp
turn of the boot, a sudden, powerful stretching of
the rack. His heart turned to lead, and he slowly
gathered himself up. With C. I. at 150 their loss
was ninety thousand dollars, and that meant simple,
complete ruin. A second and peremptory demand
for margins came from their New York correspond-
ents.

Burt wired back, " I am going to get the stock to
deliver."

Probably that good, bold lie would carry them
through the day. When he looked up from writing
the telegram C. I. stood at 160.

It was ruin, good and plenty. If the correspond-
ents would n't take his word they would close out
the deal, sell his membership to pay what it would
of the deficit and throw Burt, Westlake & Co. into
bankruptcy. It was pretty rough to ruin Westlake
as well as himself.

At half-past three, when Burt stepped out of the
elevator on the fourteenth floor of the La Salle
Building, he looked as calm, as contented, and as
well kept as ever. The suit of dark blue flannel,
with a light linen vest and the white straw hat, were
rather becoming to his large, full person and broad,
large-featured face.

Such other possible expedients as he had been able
to think of during the day had failed. This was the

203

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

forlorn hope, — a last resort before he went home to
tell Rachel that he was broke.

He had never been up here before, and he asked
the way to Mr. Salt's office of the boy who sat at a
little desk in the corridor opposite the elevator land-
ing. The door down the corridor marked " Presi-
dent " admitted him to a small and bare anteroom.
The boy took his card to the next room. In a
moment a thick-set, smooth-faced young man came
out, palpably taking stock of the caller as he ad-
vanced. Burt's card was in his hand.

" You wished to see Mr. Salt ? " he asked.
" What about, Mr. Burt ? " he put the plump ques-
tion with a certain good humor, referring to the card
for the name, as though it were perfectly understood
between them that all sorts of impossible people
wished to see Henry Salt.

" Our offices are on the ground-floor," said the
broker, as though that constituted a sort of relation-
ship. " I Ve something to say to Mr. Salt. 1 think
he will see me all right," he spoke with perfect good
humor and smiled confidently.

" I '11 see," said the young man, who had caught
the impression that the visit was for Salt's benefit
rather than the visitor's. He disappeared with the
card, and after a moment came to the dgor and
beckoned.

The secretary opened the door of the third room
from the anteroom. Burt took ofF his hat and found
himself alone with the president. Salt sat at a large,

204

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

littered desk, in a spacious, well-furnished corner
room with light on two sides. Burt advanced and
took the vacant chair at the end of the desk. Salt
looked up.

" Well, what is it ? " said the president, without
courtesy and without offence. He was ready to
listen ; but his time was valuable.

" I 'm short two thousand shares of Coal and Iron
for a customer who has no more margins," said Burt,
calmly.

The president's heavy brows gathered in an angry
frown. His hand moved toward the row of electric
call buttons at the edge of his desk. " What the
devil do you expect me to do about that ? " he de-
manded.

" I expect you to sell me the stock at a price I
can stand, or to lend it to me for a while, or to sell
it to me at the corner price and take my notes, un-
secured, in part payment. I can't ge't the stock to
deliver. My customer can't get it. I can't pay i6o
for it, because I have n't that much money. I 'm
broke at 150. I want you to let me out." He
spoke quietly, looking the other square in the eye.
He knew it to be the very crisis, and from some-
where within him there came up an ample power to
meet it. He knew that he was not going to be afraid
or to cringe. An inscrutable joy in his own readi-
ness touched his mind. His broad face lighted with
a frank, good-humored smile.

Salt stared at him, gloweringly. " Say, I like your

• 205

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

nerve," he declared. " What do you feed it on ? I
want the recipe. What do you think I 'm doing
here ? " he burst out more angrily. " Think I 'm
running a crippled children's home ? "

"No; it's plain business," said Burt, quietly,
smiling again. " If I 'm forced to settle at the cor-
ner price it will simply break me, and you '11 get
only half what 's coming to you. If you give me
time I can pay out. I can make money."

" The hell you can ! " said Mr. Salt, with fine
sarcasm. " How ? By toddling into the first corner
you find laying around loose ? "

" No. What money I have, I 've made. I can
make more. What good will it do you to break
me r

" I 'm going to do it for the good it will do you.
Every young man who tries speculation ought to be
broke a couple of times. It teaches him to respect
other people's opinions a little."

" Well, I 've had the lesson now," said Burt.

" Who are your customers ? How 'd you come to
be short two thousand shares ? " the president de-
manded.

Burt considered briefly. " My customers are
Eddie Martin, Judge Martin's son, and his cousin."

" Oh ! They knew what the decision was going
to be, then ! "

" Very likely."

" And you knew it, too ! " Salt's hard eye was
upon him. Burt said nothing, simply waiting.

206

rMowff.s roc

*' ' / like your nerve . . . What do sou feed it on?'' ''

THE SALT CROWD S TRADE

"Yes, you knew it! " the president declared. "And
— say, you have got the nerve ! You would n't
give me the tip ; but you 'd come around here and
ask me to help you out of the hole."

"Judge Martin is my friend. His family and
mine are on intimate terms," said the broker, simply.

" Why don't you go to your friend to help you,
then ? " Salt suggested.

" Of course I should n't do that, even if he had
the ability. I 'd look nice telling him his son went
short of the stock with foreknowledge of the decision,
and that I was the broker who made the trade for
him."

" I see. Would n't like to hurt his feelings."
Salt passed his hand over his stubbled chin and con-
sidered. His manner was not reassuring. " Natu-
rally I 'm not so careful of the feelings of a man
who says I ought to be indicted," he went on with
an ominous softness. " It would work out all right
if you went broke. Then, of course, it would all
come out in the bankruptcy proceedings that Judge
Martin's son went short two thousand shares of
C. I. just before Judge Martin delivered an important
decision against the company — and Judge Martin
could explain that to the newspapers any way he
liked. Would n't that be a rather pretty situation.?"

" No, it would n't be a pretty situation at all."
The broker spoke quietly, gravely, his heavy-lidded
eyes steadily on the other's face. " You know, Mr.
Salt, and I know, that there are people in the world

207

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

who never get into the game at all, — this money-
making game, I mean. They have no idea vv^hat it
is. With you in your bigger way, and with me in
my smaller way, it *s a good deal of a muddy sort of
scramble. We care enough for the game not to
mind the mud. But the clean, fresh people — you
would n't get along without them any more than I
would. They 're mostly women, those people \ but
now and then there 's a man, too. Judge Martin is
as sincere a man as ever lived, and his daughter and
my wife are friends."

Salt folded his hands over his paunch, holding
himself by a big, hairy wrist, and looked at the
younger man with a calm scrutiny. " It would be
a crime," he said gently, " to break a young man
with your nerve. You come up here without an
invitation to ask me to pull you out of the hole
you 've got into by selling my stock short, and you
tell me you knew the decision was coming against
me, and then you tell me that I 'm a muddy person.
You seem to agree with Judge Martin that I ought
to be indicted."

" Then you '11 lend me the stock," said Burt,
coolly.

"Lend you the stock? What good will that
do ? "

" Oh, I suppose it will go down again after the
shorts settle," said Burt, easily.

" You do, do you ? And you 're the man who 's
going to make me some money in the stock busi-

208

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

ness ! That stock will go up to 200, Mr. Broker.
Why, you sucker, do you suppose this decision is
going to hurt it ? That was my suit. Bynum was
my man. I had the suit started because I wanted
these questions settled. Do you think I 've been
sitting around here asleep all the time ? We '11
simply reorganize in New Jersey. The papers are
all ready now. If I lent you the stock at 160 you 'd
be worse ofF than ever in ten days."

" Well, sell it to me then and take my notes for
part."

" As one muddy friend to another, eh ? "

" As a large man to a small one."

Salt studied him a moment. "We'll put it as a
weak old man to a youngster with a cast-iron nerve.
I would n't break you for a million dollars. I want
to see what that nerve of yours will do. I '11 tell
my brokers to settle with you at 125."

" That 's very good of you, Mr. Salt," said the
broker, quietly, rising. " I will not forget it."

Salt had already turned to his desk, and the caller
turned to the door.

" Burt ! " the president called with harsh abrupt-
ness. The broker turned back to find the old man's
eye hard upon him. " I 've told you something —
about what I 'm going to do with the company.
Nobody else knows it outside the office."

The broker flushed slightly ; he bent a little for-
ward ; his chin up. " I did n't give away Judge
Martin's decision to you," he said.
14 209

THE SALT CROWD'S TRADE

" All right," said Salt, briefly, and satisfied. " Of
course I wanted it understood that it was con-
fidential." He turned his eyes to the work before
him. " Before I tie up with a man," he added, as
though he were addressing the papers before him, " I
want to know about how muddy he 's likely to be."

Westlake was waiting in the office below. "Set-
tling at 125 cuts deep just now," said Burt, after
explaining that they were released from the corner ;
" but we '11 get some of Salt's trade."

He was cheerful to the point of gayety on the
wide white porch that fine evening.

" Have the kinks come out of your business,
then ? " his wife asked, smiling. He had told her
nothing ; but she had easily guessed a trouble at the
office.

" All the kinks are out ! " he replied. He took
her hand, — beautifully shaped, white, velvet to the
touch. A dumb reverence for its soft pov/er
stirred his heart. He spread her fingers and kissed
the pink palm.

210

VII

THE END OF THE DEAL

VII

THE END OF THE DEAL

THE day's trade was done. Along La
Salle Street, from the Board of Trade
to the Stock Exchange, brokers' offices
were empty of customers. The big
blackboards where quotations had been set down
were wiped clean, ready for to-morrow's yards of
figures. The ticker was still ; the telegraphers'
desks deserted. Brokers were getting into their
overcoats and going home or to a club. The great
banks displayed the sign " Closed." Tellers counted
up the greenbacks in neatly corded stacks, the gold
in pretty pillars of double-eagles. Bookkeepers
lighted their pipes and paused a moment for socia-
bility. Armful after armful of letters accumulated
in the gaping bags, prepared for the post-office.
Janitors were sweeping up the litter. The day's
trade with its shift of fortunes was done. An army
of underlings cast the accounts and cleared the
board, ready for to-morrow's play.

213

THE END OF THE DEAL

The wide corridor which runs from end to end of
the Board of Trade on the ground-floor was nearly
empty. Brokers' offices flank the corridor on either
side, divided from it by glass windows. A window
toward the lower end bears the sign, " Lester Wells,
Commissions, Grain, Provisions, Stocks, Bonds.'*
The office is the usual affair, with its blackboards,
tickers, bulletin boards where telegrams are posted,
chairs, cuspidors. A space is divided off by a par-
tition of stained pine and glass behind which the
bookkeepers and telegraphers work. In the corner
there is a little den whose door has the sign " Pri-
vate." This is Wells's room.

Coming out of the den and striding to the corri-
dor, Robert Harper brushed by three men standing
close together at the door, talking confidentially.

He heard one of them saying : " The house is
way long of wheat. Old man Wells is loaded to
the guards with it."

"•Well, what if he is ? Ain't Bowles on the same
side ? " said another.

Harper brushed by. He was vaguely aware that
their eyes followed him. He even fancied them
saying, " That 's young Harper, Bowles's nephew,
who got dropped on account of that shady business
of mixing wheat."

This fancy troubled him only a little, because the
other trouble was so much bigger and nearer. His
interview with Wells had failed. He had gone to
the business place on a forlorn hope of reorganiz-

214

THE END OF THE DEAL

ing his position with Laura. It had been more
Laura's hope than his own ; yet now that it had
failed he was oppressed and disappointed.

His uncle, Jonathan Edwards Bowles, of the
Bowles Milling Company, had been his patron, too ;
had put him through college and then taken him
into the huge organization of his business. He
had been made manager of the Bowles elevators.
The young man knew well enough that Wells
liked him little ; but so long as Laura liked him so
much he could be patient under the father's grumpy
hostility. Then the business of mixing wheat hap-
pened. They had always been mixing the wheat
so far as Robert knew. He went on cheerfully
doing the things that had been done without a
thought of certain dusty rules which forbade it.
Of a sudden there was a scandal. The abuse had
overgrown under long tolerance. A reform was
due. The Board of Trade ordered an investiga-
tion. Bowles chose to make a statement to the
press alleging his innocence. If anybody was
mixing wheat in his elevators, he said, it was with-
out his knowledge. He was rather shocked to find
such a charge brought against his house. Harper
read the statement half an hour after he received
the summons from the Board to appear and testify
at the investigation. It was clear enough. Ob-
viously he was expected to shoulder the blame.
Perhaps, technically, he was alone to blame, for
there had been no specific instructions to him from

215

THE END OF THE DEAL

his uncle. He had merely gone on doing what
had been done. But his youth and pride arose in
revolt. He sent his resignation to the Bowles
Milling Company, ignored the summons, and was
expelled from the Board. Then Wells's hostility
dropped the veil. The broker forbade him the
house. This puzzled Harper, for he knew perfectly
well that every one in the grain trade understood
his essential innocence. It was, of course, only a
pretext seized by Wells to vent a hostility based
upon recondite grounds.

Meantime the young man knew that his uncle
was not ill-disposed toward him. It was merely
a point of discipline with the miller, whose vast
business organization had Its independent life and
polity like a state, requiring, above all, loyalty and
obedience to the needs of the concern. He sus-
pected that if he should make his apology and sub-
mission, take a new oath of fealty, he would be
reinstated.

But he never had less wish to be taken back.
His eye ran up the cliff-like granite wall of the
Board, took in the towering nests of offices which
gave the neighborhood its gigantic effect, and he
calmly repudiated the whole greedy scheme. He
turned toward Wabash Avenue, headed for the office
of the young and struggling automobile company
where he was trying to make himself a foundation.
That was good, anyway. Laura came back to him.
The disappointment mellowed. The young people

216

THE END OF THE DEAL

still had their openly clandestine meetings by the
sympathetic connivance of all their women friends.
They had their complete assurance of each other,
their perfect faith in the future. They could wait
a little while for the cloud of parental opposition to
pass; for the perfected automobile to roll up and
wheel them triumphantly away to that sunny future
which was already the present of their dreams.

An effect of this triumphal youth and love remained
with Wells in his den after Harper went out.

The broker sat by his desk, staring at the door
through which the unwelcome caller had disap-
peared, — a tall, bony, round-shouldered, grizzled
man of sixty. He wore a rusty and torn alpaca
office jacket. A black skull-cap was pushed back
on his long, narrow, bald head. The shirt-collar,
a size too large, stood away from his leathery neck,
displaying the prominent Adam's apple. There
was a patch of gray whisker in front of each ear.
His face was deeply wrinkled. His large dark
eyes fixed themselves upon the empty doorway with
a glance of singular power.

Oddly, something about the young man's broad
shoulders had suggested the presence of the girl,
giving Wells a subtle feeling of his daughter cling-
ing about the obnoxious young man like a rich
atmosphere, her love for him pleading with his

217

THE END OF THE DEAL

tongue. The sense of a great loss oppressed the
old man's heart. He felt a helplessness against
this victorious youth and love vi^hich would pres-
ently thrust him aside like a troublesome super-
numerary, leaving him old, lonely, empty.

At one point in the interview Wells put his
finger on that sore spot of the wheat mixing.
Robert, pained and embarrassed as he always was
when that business came up, feeling that it touched
his reputation, eager to exculpate himself so far as
he could, had declared that his uncle held no grudge
against him. Zealous to prove it, he had taken
from his pocketbook and handed to Wells a little
slip of yellow paper, of the sort used for memo-
randa, neither dated nor addressed, but bearing the
loosely scrawled words : " if you need money come
to me. I will let you have what you want."
By way of signature were the scrawled initials,
"J. E. B."

Now, glancing at his desk. Wells was surprised
to see this yellow slip lying before him. Both men
had forgotten it in what had followed. He took it
up, mechanically, in his surprise, and stared down
again at the scrawled characters. His impassioned
old mind, moving in its deeply worn ruts, turned
from the young lover and centred upon this slip of
paper, — upon the magic of those scarcely legible
initials.

Jonathan Edwards Bowles. When Wells was a
youth and helped 'tend his father's "general store"

218

THE END OF THE DEAL

in the New Jersey village, another youth had come
to them, the son of a widow, the poorest of the
country poor. Wells, senior, had taken him half
from charity, giving him board and a little wage.
He did the rougher jobs about the store, mowed and
raked the yard, — a chubby, barefoot lad with a
round, red-apple face. His name was Johnny
Bowles. He was frankly considered slow-witted,
but he had the most irrepressible good-nature, an
untiring will to oblige. He ran to do everything
with his moony, beaming, red-apple face. Johnny
soon got to do more in the store and less in the
stable. The country women liked to buy of him
on account of his tireless good-nature. Wells,
senior, was the substantial man of the village,
worth, it was said, ;^20,ooo. Young Wells was
the village beau, the youth of position and prospects.
When he and some others of the more elect made
game of Johnny, young Bowles took it with his
irrepressible good-humor. They knew Johnny was
stupid partly because he was so everlastingly good-
natured. When he started West, they told him
the Indians would boil him for his fat. When
Wells himself first visited Chicago, then only a
big country town, he found that Johnny had escaped
the Indians and was making a living shovelling
grain out of freight cars.

Johnny Bowles. Even to Wells, for all his
familiarity with the facts, some effort was neces-
sary, some exertion of the imagination to make

219

THE END OF THE DEAL

it seem real that once upon a time the syllable
Bowles, that word of power, was no more than
the name of a ragged youth. It was like trying
to grasp the idea that once the word Napoleon was
only the designation of an obscure cadet, signifying
no more than James or Thomas. For now Bowles
was a magic word. Under its command legions of
gold marched out. Its mere form and sound were
so charged with power that men's minds changed
at the simple sight or hearing of it. A whole
world-wide trade acknowledged its spell.

Johnny had saved his wage and been shrewd.
His first profit was a Jonah's gourd. His silver
dollars were seeds of the giant's beanstalk, produc-
ing huge growths over night. He planted in the
soil of the new western empire. His fortune shot
up with an incredible rapidity, towering, spreading,
finding new roots, becoming colossal with the huge
growth of the empire itself. Grain was the line.
As the new soil suddenly sprouted and produced
harvests, Bowles's mills spread to receive them.
He had warehouses and mills at Chicago, Minne-
apolis, Kansas City. An immense industry cease-
lessly plying with Its thousand wheels and ten
thousand hands owned him its master.

Wells had finally come to Chicago, after the
long delay in settling up his father's estate, and
embarked as a broker. For thirty years he had
sat in Bowles's growing shadow, and the shade
had turned him sick. At first Bowles's success

220

THE END OF THE DEAL

had been his inspiration. If the slow-witted
Johnny was such an alchemist, how much more
could he do ? He set out with a hot, impatient
will to overtake the apple-faced boy. He had his
successes. Half a dozen times the magic had
worked for him. He had laid his eager hands
upon a great possession. Like a man with a
handicap, he had found himself finally coming into
the stretch with his competitor. But he had had
as many failures as successes. Each time the
magic had given out ; the possessions had suddenly
slipped like water through his fingers ; he had been
hurled back, stripped, scarcely able to conceal his
nakedness from the public view. And Bowles all
the time had been going on in his colossal success.
This success was too overwhelming, too persistent.
Bowles at length acquired a power and prestige
which steadily commanded success as though he
had learned the secret of it. Wells's bitter soul
accused the gods. An inappeasable rage grew in
his mind. In Chicago the relations between the
two men had never been cordial. Even at first
Wells remembered the ragged, apple-faced boy a
little too obviously. Bowles had his gift of humor.
Some of his humor was carried back to Wells.
Now they never spoke.

Robert Harper was Bowles's nephew and had been
his protege. Wells could not forgive him that.
The blossoming of the ragged Bowles into the ac-
cepted young dandy hurt his soul. When Harper

221

THE END OF THE DEAL

entered his house palpably in quest of his daughter, it
was as though he had come invested with the Bowles
mantle of arrogant success. It was part of the in-
veterate and intolerable Bowles luck that this fellow
should come after Laura, as though the miller meant
to carry his triumph even to what was dearest to
Wells. The broker's helpless anger chafed against
it in secret. Then came the rupture between uncle
and nephew. Young Harper left the Bowles fold.
This only increased the broker's wrath, as though he
were asked to take Bowles's old clothes ; as though
a man not good enough for the Bowleses were still
good enough for the Wellses. The broker saw the
miller sending a beggar for his daughter and triumph-
ing over him anew. The rupture with Bowles gave
him a tangible ground, for it reduced Harper, money-
wise, to a shred, a tatter. No, he should n't get the
girl !

Wells looked again at the slip of yellow paper.
Without knowing why, he put it in his pocketbook,
— an act proceeding from an inexplicable motive,
a sort of vague voodooism, as though with that slip
of paper in his possession he had a bit of Bowles
within his power.

For a moment he had a strange sense of that slip
of paper in the leather case in his inner vest-pocket,
as though it possessed a living element. His deep,
settled rage against the miller burned strongly up.

He had need of all his rage just now. Long ago
he had given up the slow processes of commerce.

222

THE END OF THE DEAL

One could never overtake a Bowles that way. Just
now, pulling himself up from the last bitter defeat,
he was engaged in one of those speculations which
were forever involving him — an enterprise to seize
a fortune over night by shrewdness and daring. The
passion held out. He came back to the play after
each defeat fiercer than ever.

He turned to the affairs on his desk, the rage to
win smouldering in his heart.

Ill

Turning to his desk. Wells took up the details of
business methodically, with experienced competence.
A hand was laid on the door to the dingy den.
The office manager slipped in, silently handed a
telegram to his chief, paused a moment for instruc-
tions, and slipped out. The broker looked down at
the despatch, every faculty in a sudden, cruel arrest.
As though a sponge had passed over his brain every-
thing that had gone before was wiped out — Harper,
Laura, Bowles himself — although the message
contained Bowles's name. It was from Wells's con-
fidential agent at Kansas City. It read :

Learn from good sources that Bowles is going to ship his
wheat to Chicago. He is already engaging cars. You
can absolutely depend upon this.

It was not Bowles the man, the former barefoot,
apple-faced boy that stood before Wells's mind just

223

THE END OF THE DEAL

then. It was Bowles, the power, the abstraction,
the factor in the wheat market.

In playing for a rise. Wells had gone too far.
The rage to win had led him beyond his depth.
The rise must come at once or he would be defeated,
ruined, hurled back more naked than ever. He knew
that Bowles held a great accumulation of wheat in
the Southwest. He had calculated that the miller
must keep a certain part of this wheat to supply his
mills. He had information that all the rest was en-
gaged for export. Thus Bowles's wheat would dis-
appear. The bears would be forced to buy back
their options from Wells at his price. So he had
calculated. With this message before him he saw
that Bowles intended to bring on the Kansas City
wheat, break the market with it, and, when prices
had gone to smash, pick up the wheat again at his
leisure. In short, the stake which he had thrown
upon the table was now big enough to tempt the
miller. The screen fell, and instead of the crowd of
petty speculators whom Wells had thought to catch
in his trap, there was disclosed the giant figure of
Bowles, bland, invincible, with millions of un-
touched resources behind him, looking down at the
exhausted broker with an amused smile, calmly
reaching over his shoulder and picking up the stake.
It was like a skirmish line suddenly uncovering an
army in position. It meant instant reinforcements
or unconditional surrender. And where could Wells
find reinforcements ? His own resources were al-

224.

THE END OF THE DEAL

ready exhausted in margining the wheat he had
bought. It would require three, four, five hundred
thousand dollars at once to margin the wheat he must
now buy from Bowles. Where could he get such
a sum ? The last defeat had not only swept away
most of his fortune ; it had hurt his credit, impaired
his reputation for success. His prestige was weak-
ened like that of a general who loses once too often.
Men were no longer ready to back his skill and judg-
ment. The old broker perceived his position with
absolute clearness. It came fully back to him that
he was broken, beaten, definitely overthrown, irre-
trievably ruined. He had passed through his Water-
loo. There was nothing but blank desolation ahead.
This perception came to his mind with stunning
force. He no longer thought of Bowles as a man.
He was only an obstruction, a fact, like sun, rain,
frost. There was no rancor in his mind then.
He simply stared out at that waste, that endless
desolation.

The short winter day was passing. It was already
dark in the little den, so that the broker had to
fumble for his coat, overcoat, and hat. He left the
office without speaking and walked slowly along the
broad flagging, a lean, stooped old figure, more
stooped than ever, huddled in his overcoat. The
high granite wall of the Board of Trade loomed clifF-
like above him. Ahead, beyond the bank, the vast
flanks of the sky-scrapers arose, the serried windows,
aglow with electric lights rank on rank, high up into
15 225

THE END OF THE DEAL

the dark, giving an effect of multiplied and ceaseless
human activity. The streets were full of people
going home. Wells's blank eyes mechanically took
in this familiar scene, which now seemed strangely
alien to him, as though he had died and passed be-
yond the use of those things. As he glanced at the
low, strong wall of the bank, it came back to him
in an odd way how he had opened his first bank
account in Chicago, depositing $5000, and how im-
portant the fact had seemed. He found a cab, gave
the direction, and dropped back in a corner of the
vehicle. As they rolled through the streets, aglow
with lights and thronged with people, he kept look-
ing out mechanically. There was a kind of infinite
weariness in his eyes, as though they were tired with
having seen too much. This brave show of life, —
the thronged, lighted streets with their oflices and
shops, — how futile, how foolish it all seemed ! It
would be good to shut one's eyes. Only a dull
habit of living persisted mechanically. The old man
lying back in his corner of the cab still stared out at
the streets.

When the cab stopped before his house. Wells
climbed out, handed up a bill, and turned away with-
out waiting for the change. He scarcely heard the
cabman's respectful acknowledgment.

The house faced Illinois Boulevard. It had been
built before the last defeat, when the broker felt

226

THE END OF THE DEAL

himself far along on the slippery highway to fortune,
with firm footing under him. Moreover Laura was
just coming home from school. Bowles's splendid
new mansion on the Lake Shore Drive had been in
Wells's mind. It was a fine house. The architect
had done his best by it. Now Wells and his wife
lived in a little space on the second floor, and Laura
did what she could with the costly emptiness down-
stairs.

Only the father, mother, and daughter sat down
to dinner, — a simple meal, which, however, the
butler served with due care because Laura was there.
If she had been away, the man would have left the
old couple mostly to themselves and the dinner
would have been as plain as a clerk's.

Wells ate mechanically, in silence, his large, dark
eyes downcast, replying in monosyllables, absently,
to his wife's few questions.

Laura, too, ate in silence. In color the daughter
was between the father and the mother. Her brown
hair had glints of red, of which there was a reflec-
tion in her brown eyes. She had heard from Robert
of the failure of his attempt with her father. She
and her mother had had their talk. She had pre-
pared herself to make her submission. She called
up her power of love, fixing it upon this harsh old
man, loving him in spite of himself because he
belonged in the lovely world which contained
Robert. She waited purposely until he was in the
dining-room. Then she came, in her bright, slender

227

THE END OF THE DEAL

grace, her head slightly tilted back, her fair chin
thrust out, a faint smile parting her lips, the great
fact of the day in her mind, ready to make her sub-
mission, to love him in spite of himself.

Wells had already taken his seat at the table,
oblivious alike to wife and daughter. He did
not even look up. He was scarcely aware of
the girl's entrance. Mother and daughter exchanged
glances, conveying a world of meaning, — Laura re-
buffed, wounded, indignant ; the mother silently
pleading for the man. Mrs. Wells's broad, flat face
still had a certain faded fairness. Her light yellow
hair had grown very thin and was thickly lined with
gray. Of heavy, ample figure, wholesome, motherly,
one felt her still the farmer's daughter. Her atten-
tion hung upon her husband with a fond, constant
solicitude. She silently pleaded for him with their
daughter.

Laura kept her eyes to her plate, pretending to
eat. Once or twice, as Wells gave an absent, inept
monosyllable in reply to his wife, Laura looked over
at her mother, and again that world of meaning, the
whole drama of the household, silently passed
between them. The girl's eyes said : " Why does
he treat us so ? He cares nothing for us. He for-
gets our existence. My happiness, my love for
Robert, my love for him — he does n't even know
of it ! Why does he treat us so ? " The mother
silently pleaded for him, her anxious heart aroused
to keep the daughter's love for the father, — that

228

THE END OF THE DEAL

mother's legacy which she had seen in so much
danger of late and had worked to preserve.

Laura felt the appeal. She felt her own power to
love.

" Have you had a good day, father ? " she asked
presently. Her eyes shone on the silent man, the
faint smile parted her lips.

" 1 don't know," Wells muttered mechanically,
aware from the surface of a sound in his ears.

Laura dropped her fork. Her lips trembled.
She looked at her mother with indignation, ready to
leave the table.

In a moment it came to Wells, through the
abstraction, that Laura had been speaking, and
instantly a recollection of Harper's visit flashed upon
his mind. Startled, in a whirl of confused emotion,
he looked up at his daughter. She accused him.
She was going to push him aside. He was old,
alone, beaten, ruined. For a moment he felt her
bright grace shining into his murky world. But he
had someway played wrong here, too. He looked
down at his plate.

Finishing the meal in silence, he went upstairs to
the room they called his study, — a companion place
to the den at his office. It was a mechanical fol-
lowing of habit. He did not know why he had
come there or what he was to do. He got a cigar
without turning on the light, drew his chair to the
window and sat in the dark, staring out at the
boulevard.

229

THE END OF THE DEAL

It seemed impossible to go to bed and leave the
utter ruin impending. Yet he could do nothing.
There was a dull, painful confusion in his mind, and
he found himself thinking mechanically of incon-
sequential things in his helplessness and loneliness.

The hours went by. Mrs. Wells sat in her room,
the evening newspaper in her lap, but unable to read.
Twice she had stolen downstairs and gone noise-
lessly from room to room merely from the necessity
of some kind of action. Twice she had gone up to
the closed dark door of her husband's room, turning
away each time, reluctant to enter. Her prescience
had guessed a calamity which grew more and more
menacing to her mind as the time passed. She had
been to Laura's room, too, but had not entered,
unwilling to alarm the girl.

At last, with the courage of her anxiety, she went
to the study and opened the door.

" You here, Lester ? " she called softly into the
dark as she entered.

" Yes," a dull voice answered from the window.

At the sound of that dull voice the elderly woman's
attitude suddenly changed. Her heart throbbed up
with an odd pain and power. It was as though,
long ago, one of her children had called to her, ail-
ing, in the night. The hesitation disappeared. She
crossed the room at once.

" It 's late," she suggested.

Wells lay humped and sprawled in the easy-chair
before the window, his long arms dangling inert

230

THE END OF THE DEAL

over the arms of the chair, staring out at the
night.

Mrs. Wells pushed a chair close beside her hus-
band's and sat down. Her motherly hand, bold in
solicitude, touched his brow, his cheek.

"You ain't feeling very well, are you, Lester?"
she asked in the voice she would have used beside the
bed of a sick child, — cheery, but full of love. The
old broker's stricken heart quaked for its sympathy.

" No," he answered dully.

She lifted his feverish hand and held it between
her cool palms.

" What 's the matter, dear ? " she entreated.

The broker, his hand inert in hers, looked slowly
around at her. The rays of an electric lamp in the
street dimly revealed her face, loving, full of sym-
pathy. To Wells it was still the face of Susan
Mills. He was scarcely aware that thirty years had
changed it. In his habitual preoccupation he was
still always aware of the atmosphere of her affection
about him, even when he gave least sign of it.

" I 'm broke, mother," he said simply.

There was no need of more. She had known in-
definitely of defeats, of fluctuations, of ups and
downs. Hovering over the life of this dumb, ab-
sorbed man, she had caught the effect of that in-
cessant battle uptown. She knew at once what
this simple declaration meant. It was the final de-
feat in the long fight. She understood the depths
of his misery. Her hands tightened over him.

231

THE END OF THE DEAL

" Mother " and " father " were the deepest words
of their affection, knit into their lives long ago, in
more articulate, less absorbed days, when the little
boy had died, and later when the daughter came and
was the big fact to both of them.

She waited a moment, clasping his hand in a
silent outflow of sympathy.

" It 's too bad, father," she said, when the silent,
caressing moment had passed. " It 's too bad for
you. I know how you feel it. But it ain't every-
thing. We were happy before you got rich. We
can be happy again. You know, when little Lester
was taken away, it seemed that we could n't ever
care about anything less that happened to us.
This ain't anything like that, dear."

A strange resurrection of the past took place in
the broker's heart. It came up all the stronger be-
cause his long abstraction had left it untouched. In
his woe he again felt himself simple, a man of affec-
tion, surrounded by love. The death of his boy
oddly blent itself with this new misfortune, subtly
ennobling it, lifting it to pure tragedy. His bound
heart loosened. His hard old will softened under
the resurrection of affection.

" I Ve been in pretty hard luck lately, mother. I
guess I 've lost the knack. Things have gone
against me." His voice sounded weak, almost
querulous.

" But it ain't everything, father," she insisted

gently.

232

THE END OF THE DEAL

" I could stand it well enough myself," he went
on, " but I hate to have it come now. You 're
gettin' on in years, mother; and Laura — " His
voice choked, and the old man stopped, stubbornly
struggling with his emotion.

" Laura 's young, father, and the young don't al-
ways understand," the mother said eagerly ; " but
she knows how much you think of her. She 'd be
the last one that would n't take anything like this in
the right way. You '11 see that she does take it
right. I know she will. For us, father, it just
gives us a chance to help you more. Don't you
fear about Laura."

" I meant to do mighty well by my girl," said the
man, with pathetic simplicity. He felt the ruin of
that dream also in his failure. The wife saw that
tears were dripping from his eyes, and the tears re-
stored him close to her heart, brought the old man
home to her breast. Her own eyes were wet from
sympathy. They were lovers again.

" Never you mind, Lester," she said. " We '11
get together what there is left. Maybe we '11 be
better ofF."

" There won't be much left, Susie. It 's about
all gone," said Wells. In his softened and loosened
mood he began telling her about his money affairs,
just as they used to talk those affairs over long ago,
before his operations became too big and compli-
cated, before he became immersed in his passion.
He talked on and on, seeming to find a sad consola-

233

THE END OF THE DEAL

tion in putting it all before her. The talk rambled,
touched on things far back in their lives. They
were lovers again, sitting by the window in the dark
room, holding each other's hands, sometimes weep-
ing silently — as much over the precious resurrection
of the past as over the present calamity.

Theirs had been a long engagement. For some
years Wells held the plan of coming to Chicago.
Settling up his father's estate and realizing on the
property involved a delay. Again, after he came to
Chicago, some years elapsed before he had got himself
satisfactorily under way, before he had made a firm
enough foundation. He was thirty when he returned
to New Jersey, rich, according to the simple hamlet
standards, to marry Susan Mills. This long fidelity,
this coming back in his success to claim her, had
always lain in the woman's heart as a romance.
She cherished it with a touch of poetry. It seemed
something fine and knightly to her. The tradition
helped to keep her love fresh and strong during
these later years of abstraction.

" I meant to do mighty well by my girl," he said
again, when they came back to that.

" Laura knows that ; she knows," said the mother,
quickly. • " Of course — you can't help a girl's fall-
ing in love." She made the suggestion gently, with
a touch of anxiety.

It brought Harper to the old man's mind. "But
maybe I ain't done as well by her as I ought," he
confessed humbly. In this soft mood there was a

234

THE END OF THE DEAL

sudden immense yearning to have his girl close by
his heart. " If Harper can take care of her, I won't
stand in the way any more — if it '*s what she wants,"
he said. " You tell her, mother, that if Harper can
take care of her I won't say any more. Tell her
that from me, mother."

" She '11 be very happy. She 's good, Lester,"
the mother murmured.

Wells arose as she got up. With a certain awk-
wardness he put his arm around her ample waist and
kissed her. It was her knight come back again.

" Yes, I 'm going to bed in a minute ; I must
smoke a little," he said quite cheerfully, with an odd
conscious fondness in his voice. He accepted his
ruin. He felt himself made simple and good again,
cleansed and purified by this reunion.

The woman's hand lingered on his shoulder with
a touch of the sweetheart. She felt a joy, a good
victory won out of this defeat. The money was
little to the farmer's daughter.

"Don't smoke too long, father. It's 'most
morning," she said fondly.

She went out, happier than she had been in a
long time. The happiness, the rekindled love, and
the need of love turned at once to Laura. She went
to the daughter's room and turned on an electric
lamp. Laura lay asleep, her long hair in a thick
braid. In the innocence of sleep, her hair in a
simple braid, she looked to the mother almost like a
little schoolgirl again.

THE END OF THE DEAL

Laura turned, wrinkling her brows on account of
the light, and awoke. She sat up abruptly in bed,
staring at her mother with the confusion of a person
suddenly aroused from deep sleep.

Mrs. Wells sat on the edge of the bed. " Your
father gives his consent, dear," she said.

" Consent — ," repeated Laura, confused, un-
able to understand this summons in the middle of
the night. "You mean — to Robert ? "

" As soon as Robert can take care of you. He
thinks it 's for your happiness. He won't say any-
thing more against it — as soon as Robert can take
care of you. He wanted me to tell you so. He 's
good, dear.'*

A splendid dream dawned upon the girl. Her
mind still scarcely comprehended, but her heart
understood. She and Robert were to be married —
that was what this call in the middle of the night
meant. It seemed a kind of miracle, a sort of
angelic visitation, which her mind could not com-
prehend ; but her heart understood. Warm with
the sleep in which all things are possible, she felt an
immense love for everything.

" He 's good, dear," she heard her mother say.

"You tell him that I love him," said the girl.
" Wait, I '11 go myself." She moved to arise,
ready to go at once to her father as she was.

The mother's instinct understood the splendid
dream, the will to love, transforming the girl's

heart.

236

THE END OF THE DEAL

" He '11 be going to bed now, dear. You can
tell him in the morning," she said.

Laura accepted this, as she accepted all the rest,
with simple, unquestioning mind. " You tell him
that I love him," she said again, as though she
could give her father her heart in her two hands.

" I wanted to tell you right away — so you 'd
know," said Mrs. Wells, softly.

" Yes," said Laura, simply. That was part of
the splendid dream in which every one, everything
was lovely.

She lay down again as her mother went out,
looking into the dark, the warm languor of sleep
gathering about her. It all seemed natural and
simple because every person and everything was
beautiful and lovely. Once she aroused with a
sharp pang. The thought flickered in the dimness
of her mind: "But it was only a dream!" At
once she knew that the dream was true. She lay
back again, smiling, and went to sleep with the
dream rich and still in her heart.

Like an inveterate smoker. Wells felt in his nerves
a strong craving for tobacco after the long talk with
his wife. He lit a cigar and sat down again, mean-
ing to smoke only a few minutes.

He had the consciousness of a state of peace.
He felt good, aiFectionate, simple. He was at once

237

THE END OF THE DEAL

aware that the reunion with his wife which had
clarified his heart had had a like effect upon his
mind. The mere painful stupefaction of defeat had
passed away. The feverish tenseness of the specula-
tion was gone. There was a freshness and clarity
in his thoughts as though the purification of his
emotions, the turning back to the past, had swept
all the febrile rubbish out of his brain.

As he sat slowly pulling at his cigar, his cleared
mind turned back by a kind of inevitable habit,
without any volition on his part, to the disastrous
campaign which was ending in Waterloo. It lay
before him like a map. He had a purely intellectual
pleasure in surveying and judging it. He could see
now with the greatest clearness where he had made
his mistake \ where the passion had run away with
him and he had over-bought, when he should have
been preparing himself against Bowles's coup, which
would have been taken into a sound reasoning as
among the contingencies to be guarded against. If
he had turned just here ! He saw it so clearly
now. The point where the fortune had slipped
away from him stood out so distinctly that his
nerves felt a shock as though, in fact, the gold were
even then running swiftly through his fingers. But
for this fatal over-confidence the campaign was
good. He even felt a touch of surprise and admira-
tion as his clear thought marshalled its strong points.
Yes, a man should have won in it. The veteran
speculator surveyed it like a general looking over a

2;8

THE END OF THE DEAL

lost battle, recognizing the mistake which had
brought defeat. Merely to hav^e turned aside here,
to have held a reserve there! The temperature of
his mind was rising. Of course it was lost now.
In one clear glance he saw that he was not of those
timorous adventurers who sail close to shore, seizing
a tiny advantage and hurrying to harbor with it.
He must win greatly or lose. Well, he had lost.
Yet, even now, with half a million dollars or per-
haps somewhat less, he would win in spite of Bowles.
His mind protested against Fortune's stupid in-
justice in letting Bowles win when in fact he was
the better man. With half a million —

He looked at his watch. Half-past four. The
new day was at hand, the day of his open acknowl-
edged defeat. It flashed upon his brain that in only
a few hours he would be going down to his office to
shut it up, to confess himself a bankrupt, to publish
his ruin. The nearness of this formal acknowl-
edgment wrenched his heart anew with the full
anguish of defeat. The minute-hand of the watch
seemed to be inexorably pushing him up to this
death, — dragging him along to be devoured by
Bowles. Bowles would swallow him up at a gulp.
He would be a luncheon for Bowles, dropped into
that insatiable maw as a mere bite, over which
Bowles would smile superciliously in his everlasting
luck.

He got up and began pacing the floor, the fire
slowly, steadily rising in his heart.

239

THE END OF THE DEAL

Abruptly, in an irrepressible rage, in a blind
passion of resistance, he went to the house telephone,
called the stable and ordered the carriage brought
around at once. He changed slippers for shoes,
and began pacing the floor again like a caged tiger,
his impassioned mind reaching out, scheming, con-
triving with all its power and cunning. He slipped
downstairs, in his impatience ; put on his overcoat
and hat, and let himself silently out of the house.
When the carriage came around in the dark, the
coachman saw the humped old figure pacing up and
down the walk. The wife was vastly remote, a
dim speck at the confines of his mind. He did not
even leave word for her.

It was the most dead and dark and cold of all
the hours. The streets lay still and empty, en-
gulfed in night. A solitary owl car jingled dis-
mally by, the horses' muzzles frosted with their
breath. Here and there a lighted window showed
wanly like a sleepy eye. A muffled policeman on
his beat or a lone pedestrian stared at the carriage,
driven rapidly through the bitter cold.

As the carriage rolled on, the slow dissolution of
the dark, the cold transformation from death to life
began. Bare trees with stark branches and build-
ings some distance off began to emerge in outline
from the void blackness. The first electric car
whirled by with the glow and energy of day. The
world began revealing itself in form and color. The
act proceeded more rapidly. The curtain was visibly

240

THE END OF THE DEAL

rolling up. The coachman, peering between his
wrappings, the exposed strip of his face stony and
stinging with cold, could see the red brick and the
white stone trimmings on the house in Prairie
Avenue before which he drew up.

Wells, plunging from the carriage, with no eye
for the transformation, was vaguely surprised to find
the day already near at hand. To him it meant
only that he must hurry. His insistent summons
roused the house. At length a man appeared, dull
with sleep and angry at being called from his warm
bed at that unconscionable hour. But he recognized
the caller and carried his imperious word upstairs.
Holiday, the retired wholesale grocer, a man of
Wells's own age, was sitting up in bed, already
awakened by the ringing, when the man knocked at
his door.

Wells was in the hall, where the man had turned
on the lights, still muffled in his overcoat, his hat
in his hand, when Holiday came down the stairs.
The merchant had on slippers, trousers, and night-
gown. He had thrown a gayly colored dressing-
robe over his shoulders, and was holding it together
at his chilly neck with one hand. His flowing, iron-
gray side-whiskers, which usually lent so much dig-
nity to his appearance, were now oddly rumpled and
tousled from the pillow. His suspenders were down,
and with the other hand he held the unsupported
trousers over his big paunch. He came down the
stairs, peering for Wells, consciously trying to look
1 6 241

THE END OF THE DEAL

sympathetic. At this untimely summons a dozen
calamities had rapidly presented themselves to his
mind, — death in the family, suicide, an elopement, a
mortal illness. Thus roused from his bed, his swift
indefinite presentiments had been all of some domes-
tic misfortune, some calamity of the household. At
that hour of the night he had not thought about
money. He put out his hand as far as he could,
holding his trousers in place by the pressure of his
elbow.

" Why, Lester, what is it ? " he asked sympa-
thetically. They had been friends for twenty-five
years ; but Holiday had never called him Lester
except once, ten years before, when they had got
over-jolly together at the annual dinner of the
Chicago Commercial League.

Really touched by this friendliness, and at the
same time with a vague, grim sense of humor which
moved him to a slight smile. Wells went at the
business at once.

" I 'm in the hole, Marshall," he said, taking the
other's personally intimate ground. " I 've got to
have some money right away."

Without pause he plunged into the details of the
situation, which Holiday could instantly understand.
He was long so much wheat ; so much more was
coming on the market which he must find the money
to margin. If he could hold up the price and carry
his wheat thirty days, a sure profit was in sight — as
certain as the rising of the sun. The harvest in

242

THE END OF THE DEAL

Argentine had turned out poorly. She did n't have
half a crop. Her exports in the spring would be
only twenty per cent what they were last year.
All the surplus winter wheat in Kansas, Nebraska,
and Oklahoma had been marketed. There was a
famine in India. France was short and would
have to import heavily in the spring. If this
Chinese business should bring on a European war,
as everybody said it was going to, wheat would
jump forty cents ; it would go to a dollar and
a quarter in Chicago overnight. Look at the
visible supply ! It was thirty-five per cent smaller
than a year ago. Even now, six months from
harvest, the mills at Minneapolis had hard work
to get what grain they wanted of the right grade for
grinding.

The two men stood up together in the chilly
hall. Wells muffled in his overcoat, Holiday hold-
ing up his trousers with one hand, gathering the
gayly colored robe about his cold neck with
the other, his eyes on the broker's impassioned
face, slightly frowning, as much from the mental
effort of following Wells's rapid exposition as
from his reluctance to follow it at all; entirely
on his guard and aloof at first, his suspicions and
conservatism coming out the moment money was
mentioned.

As Wells went on, laying out the game before
his friend, his passion grew. The vehemence with
which he insisted upon winning augmented his own

243

THE END OF THE DEAL

faith. His exao-aeration increased his own convic-

tion. As he spread out the game before his friend,
his own rage for the play became hotter. His blood-
shot eyes looked more angry. He had a veteran air.
The atmosphere of a hundred battles of finance
seemed to blow about him.

This vehemence slowly infected the colder blood
of the older man. This passion a little fired the
more cautious brain with the lure of the game.
Holiday's own ample fortune had been made in the
prosaic way of trade and by an enormous advance
in the value of a single plot of ground on State Street
which he had bought twenty years before for a price
which now represented merely the annual rental of
the lot. Cautious, even timid where money was
concerned, with little faith in himself, he had a high
reputation for conservatism and sound judgment.
Several times at long intervals and in an almost fur-
tive way he had tried a tiny speculation in stocks or
grain through Wells — the small matter of buying
200 shares or 10,000 bushels. In these occasional
timid little ventures he had neither lost nor won.
But secretly he had long nursed all a timid, cautious
man's envy for those bold operations, those big plays,
in which an immense profit, a whole fortune was
seized at a stroke. He was more or less in the
atmosphere of speculation. Half his acquaintances
speculated more or less. He had a real friendliness
for Wells, a will to help him — if it could be done
safely. Under the fire of the broker's passion his

244

THE END OF THE DEAL

colder blood warmed; the lure of the game appealed
to his secret desire.

"Let 's go into the library," he said, his fat per-
son shivering from the chill of the hall.

In the library he lighted the gas grate, holding his
hap-hazard draperies about him as best he could.
Wells went on. He told more exactly of his
position and needs.

" I came to you," he said, " and we can go to
Bunner and Yocum. I believe they '11 go in with
me, too."

The mere mention of these other names lent
some assurance to Holiday. He was half won
over ; but from habit he kept up his skeptical,
questioning attitude.

" But how does Bowles stand in the wheat mar-
ket now ? " he asked cautiously.

" Why, Bowles — Bowles knows what *s trumps
in the wheat market as well as 1 do. He knows
wheat 's going up. You '11 find him buying the
wheat before long. He 's been picking up the
stuff in Kansas for export this last month."

He knew at once that disclosure of Bowles's
opposition would be fatal. Holiday would never
risk a penny against that magic name. He felt
that he had his man almost won over. Success
lay just within touch of his fingers. His terrible
anxiety, his rage to win — not only to escape
Bowles, but to wrest a fortune from that man's
hands — swept him irresistibly into an act which

245

THE END OF THE DEAL

was unpremeditated, yet which he had been un-
consciously prepared for ever since he called his
carriage. He saw it in a flash.

" See here ! " he said, pulling open his overcoat.
He plunged his hand inside his vest, drew out his
pocketbook, took from it the slip of paper — a
yellow slip, undated, unaddressed, saying : " If you
want money come to me. I will let you have
what you want."

"You know how Bowles helps a man out," said
Wells. " He 'd take my hide. But you can see
how he stands."

Holiday looked respectfully down at the magic
initials "J. E. B.," fully convinced at last.

Wells moved about the library with a constrained,
subdued restlessness, while Holiday hurried upstairs
to dress for the drive to Bunner's. The old
broker's heart was hot with the stir of the fight
which he saw before him, for which he was already
planning. As to this preliminary skirmish of get-
ting the necessary money, he felt that in winning
Holiday, he had already more than half succeeded.
With Holiday at his side Bunner would be half
convinced at the start ; and with both Holiday and
Bunner, Yocum would not hold back.

It was as he calculated. They drove to Bunner's
house, calling the rich lumberman from his bed.
The mere presence of Holiday, the solid and con-
servative, gave the venture a secure effect. Yocum
was already at breakfast when the three arrived at

246

THE END OF THE DEAL

his house, and his consent was won in twenty
minutes' talk, Holiday and Bunner sitting one on
either side o^ Wells. They left Yocum to his morn-
ing meal and drove uptown.

It was eight o'clock when the three men sat
down to breakfast in a hotel. The streets were
alive with the pulse and rush of business. Wells
was in the best of humor. He was almost gay.
He had ;^400,ooo as good as in his hands. It was
merely a matter of waiting for the bank to open.
He had won the desperate preliminary skirmish
against almost hopeless odds, and the sense that
he had won lifted up his will and courage. He
appeared at his office at the usual hour, alert,
shrewd, resourceful, as full of fight as a ferret.

He went home to dinner that nio-ht, tired from
the tremendous strain of the day, but in the great-
est good-humor. He met his wife's anxious, ques-
tioning eyes with a ready smile. She knew from
the coachman of his early morning quest, and now,
from his great good-humor, from his triumphant
smile, she guessed, in the main, what had happened,
and resigned herself to his will.

Laura came gliding swiftly into the hall, her mind
still in the radiant transformation of her splendid
dream. She put her arm about her father's neck,
her eyes shining into his with happy tenderness.

" I think you 're good, papa," she whispered ;
and then, instantly from the old man's blank stare,
she perceived that he had forgotten her.

247

THE END OF THE DEAL

It was only an instant before Wells remembered.

"Oh!" he exclaimed. "Yes, — I hope you
will be happy." He said it most awkwardly ;
embarrassed, secretly ashamed because he had for-
gotten. His whole stubborn repugnance to Harper
came up in his mind. "Well, I hope you'll be
happy," he repeated mechanically, and hastily kissed
her brow.

The girl turned away. In her pain at the
moment, it seemed to her that she finally gave
her father up.

The Empire Automobile Company had a ground-
floor room on Wabash Avenue, where several
styles of horseless carriages, displayed behind the
broad show windows, might tempt buyers. But
the factory occupied the top story of a dingy brick
building in that packed, smoky region of factories
west of the river. This dismal loft was lighted
with gas-jets even on the brightest days.

At the rear of the long, bare room, near the
windows through which some light fell, a mechani-
cal contrivance lay on two wooden horses. Five
men were gathered about it. Harper had taken ofF
his coat and vest, collar and cuffs. The shirt-
sleeves were rolled up on his brawny arms, and his
hands were black with iron and oil. His feet were
firmly planted, well apart, his chin belligerently
squared as he looked down at the machine. Tuf-

248

THE END OF THE DEAL

ford, the president of the company, stood next him,
— a carriage manufacturer of some means, lank and
grizzled, a bony Yankee; an enthusiast, as full of
dreams as a boy about this automobile venture.
He had unbuttoned his coat and vest, and he held
his big soiled hands conspicuously away from his
clothes, spread out like two platters. He raised the
cleaner hand, and with that wrist absently wiped
the dusty sweat from his brow. Barry, the fore-
man of the factory, burly in coarse blackened
clothes and leather apron, grimy from head to foot,
stood by, intelligently waiting. Hurd, the secre-
tary. Harper's friend, trig and spotless as when he
left the office, sat on an upturned box nervously
smoking his cigar and glancing anxiously from one
man to another. He alone knew absolutely noth-
ing of mechanics. Frowning, he looked down at
the mysterious contrivance of brass and iron which
held their fortunes. Bliss, the Inventor of the
motor, a slight man with a beardless face, boyish-
looking in spite of his forty years, was on his hands
and knees in the dirt peering up at the machine.
Beside him, their heads fairly touching, squatted
Mercer, the expert sent by the omnibus company.
This was the improved motor at which they had
been working. If it proved satisfactory there would
be a big order from the omnibus company, and the
help of some additional capital — in short, smooth
sailing for the automobile concern, which had been
bobbing through troubled waters.

249

THE END OF THE DEAL

Bliss turned a stop. The mechanism began to
move slowly, smoothly. The two men on the floor
fixed their eyes more intently on the plying rod and
turning shaft. Tufford opened his mouth and for-
got to close it. Harper stooped over the machine,
breathless. Hurd fastened his teeth, dog-like, in
the butt of his cigar. Bliss opened the stop wider.
The motion accelerated, the rod flew, the shaft
whirled, smoothly, steadily. A tense moment
passed. Bliss sat back on his heels, the tumbled
hair over his forehead.

" There ! Do you see ? " he demanded.

The expert squatted and squinted a moment
longer; then stood up, stretched himself, dusted his
hands one against the other.

" Oh, it 's all right," he said conclusively.

Hurd sprang up in a quiver of excitement, and
met Harper's triumphant glance. The two stood
together, too content for speech, grinning down at
the swift, smooth, live machine, for which they felt
an affection such as a man feels for his horse which
has won the race.

After Harper had washed his hands and arms at
the iron sink used by the workmen, he came back,
followed by Hurd, and stood over the machine, dry-
ing his hands on a rough towel. He liked to look
at the thing, — to contemplate this beautiful contriv-
ance of brass and steel which he had helped to
create with his brain and his hands. At college he
had been high in football, but only so-so in the

250

THE END OF THE DEAL

classes. He knew that he was Intelligent ; but he
liked best to deal with things that were ponder-
able, upon which he could lay his two muscular
hands. He liked to exert the strength of his big
body. Drying his hands, he contemplated the motor
with a full content. It meant success. It meant
Laura. He wished that she could have been there
to see how beautifully it proved itself. He had an
odd feeling that she ought to love it for the splendid
precision and smoothness of its action, and that her
gratitude to it would be a full compensation, in the
great economy of things, for this creation, this birth
of power. Looking down, he fixed the aspect of
the machine anew in his mind with the deliberately
joyous idea of thus conveying it to her that
evening, so that it might receive its due of her
appreciation.

It meant success — and Laura. He had fairly
won it with his hands and brain. The fixing of
the wedding day was contingent only upon the
success of this last test.

Crossing the river at Van Buren Street and glanc-
ing over at the towering nests of offices about the
Board of Trade, he thought again how much finer
it was for a fellow to help to make something with
his own hands and brain. His success might not
mean much money-wise as money was counted
over there, but it would mean enough. He told
himself that he was not smart enough for the big
game — and that he was glad of it.

251

THE END OF THE DEAL

As he strode along Pacific Avenue under the
clifF-like wall of the Board of Trade, the big bell
rolled out an iron stroke, the solemn warning slowly
reverberating through the building.

It lacked but five minutes of the close. Harper
saw the sign " Lester Wells " on the broad win-
dow and glanced in. The lean, stooped figure of
the broker bent over a ticker beside the window.
The office was crowded with men. There was a
tremendous wheat market. Argentine's wheat crop
had turned out a failure. India had ceased export-
ing. Warmer weather had revealed ravages by-
Hessian fly in Indiana and Ohio. France was bid-
ding up. The newspapers said that Germany's
reply to England meant war. The Czar was mass-
ing troops in Manchuria. England had sent a flying
squadron to sea with sealed orders. War meant dear
wheat, and the price was climbing. Upstairs frantic
brokers were bidding the sixteenths and eighths
which flashed over the world. The strife of thou-
sands of men and millions of money converged there ;
and Lester Wells was the prophet and captain of
the triumphant bulls. His fortune grew in a noon-
day magic.

Harper knew these things from the newspapers
and from gossip. He glanced into the broker's
office, and up at the clifF-like walls whence he had
been contemptuously cast. And the joy of the
motor was stronger within him than ever. " A
cheerful lot of lunatics!" he thought with happy

252

THE END OF THE DEAL

extravagance. What was it to him that May wheat
was closing at 98 J ?

He glanced over at the huge brown cube of the
Rookery where, high up, the Bowles Milling Com-
pany occupied an entire floor, fifty offices opening
one into another, in one of which the miller sat at
his desk, fat, bald, imperturbable. They told him
that wheat had closed at 98I. The miller glanced
up, slightly elevated his thin eyebrows, then laughed
with the utmost good-humor.

" That beggar Wells is making this wheat cost
me something," he said, and laughed again, really
amused at Wells's success, fully appreciating the
joke of being worsted by such an antagonist. His
smile was singularly pleasing, lighting up the heavy
face. But in his perfect good-humor one could per-
ceive also his perfect assurance, — the unshaken
equanimity of the man who knows how the game
must end, believing in his power to lay down stake
after stake, to bring up million after million and
crush the opponent finally under the weight of his
inexhaustible reserves.

VII

It was Laura herself who answered Robert's ring
that evening and let him into the house. She wore
a plain muslin dress. In her absolute assurance of
that future which was so little beyond them, she de-
lighted her heart by anticipating its simple conditions

253

THE END OF THE DEAL

in every way possible. Her costly dresses were put
aside. When she went out of an evening in her
simplest gov/n, she felt herself already joyously ac-
cepting the limitations of Robert's purse. Her ardor
drew a happy inspiration from the fact that she was
dressed less expensively than any other woman there.
To go uptown in the street cars was an act of faith
from which she derived the deepest happiness.
When Robert called she Hstened for his ring, run-
ning to admit him herself; and meeting him at the
door in this way was like meeting him at the veri-
table door of their future.

Robert stood a moment on the doorstep, not offer-
ing to enter, broadly beaming at her. He liked to
have his wordless joke with her in this manner, over
the running to the door, the muslin gown, the street-
car rides ; but he was sensible of the perfect faith
which made her ardor full of dignity.

He had his other precious joke, — the success of
the motor. Their automobile was ready for them.
The marriage might now take place in April, as they
had planned. He began telling her about it at once.
They went to the second and smaller parlor off the
hall, where they sat alone like a girl and her beau,
talking it over.

It was an odd whim which moved Wells to walk
in there.

The broker had spent the evening at his office.
He had checked over figures, made calculations,
written letters, left instructions, all in the manner

254

THE END OF THE DEAL

of the sober, self-contained reasoning man of busi-
ness ; yet all the while amid these ordinary activities
a great hot intoxication glowed in the centre of his
mind. He was winning. His profits were piling up
thousands upon thousands. Fortunes were shower-
ing into his hands. He was winning from Bowles.
Even the infallible miller, the acknowledged poten-
tate, the undefeated favorite of the gods, now felt
the touch of his power and bent beneath it. After
his long struggle below he was now emerging high
and far on the golden uplands.

But there was more than this. The scarcity of
breadstuff's at home, the foreign demand, the talk
of war, had at last infected all Christendom with a
panic to buy wheat. Every man felt an irresistible
power in the market, begotten of a sudden world-
wide impulse. Wells was no longer the harassed
adventurer hazardously struggling to devise a rise.
The market rose of itself in response to an over-
powering, universal movement, and Wells simply
floated up with the great tide. No man felt this un-
controllable force which had come into the market
more keenly than the veteran speculator himself.
The converging of this irresistible, universal impulse
beat upon his nerves, stimulating and intoxicating
him. He walked in front, but there was the sound
of a million feet behind him.

This afternoon one of the office men, bending
over the ticker and shouting out the quotations for
the crowd, who were too impatient to wait for them

THE END OF THE DEAL

to be put on the blackboard, cried : " Ninety-six for
May — now a quarter — a half — sells at ninety-
seven !

The youth's voice vibrated w^ith excitement, and
to the crowd of speculators — Wells's followers —
these cries were like the shouts of victory in battle.
Hardened nerves thrilled at them. Wells's face was
impassive; but a great red glow burned in his mind.

When he left the office in the evening, chancing
to glance over at the white formidable square of the
bank, — the Gibraltar of finance, — the inordinately
drunken idea came to him that his power was as
great as the bank's. In his mind there was the sense
of an immense space, in which he stood solitary,
commanding.

Entering the hall of his house, he saw the light in
the second room, heard his daughter's low, happy
laughter, and felt an odd impulse to put his triumph
on a more intimate stage ; to show himself for a
moment in his victory. He stepped to the door, en-
tered the room, his lean, stooped figure as ill-dressed
as usual, his chin stubbled over with a two days'
beard. Yet in his mien, in his dark eyes, something
of his triumph showed, — a gleam through the hard
crust from the great glow in his mind. He entered
the room, and halted.

The two young people sat near together in the
corner. They looked up, surprised at the entrance
of this figure amid the intimacy of their talk, in the
atmosphere of their dream, even embarrassed for a

256

THE END OF THE DEAL

moment as though some apology were expected from
them.

Wells saw the two bright young faces turned
toward him in surprise, with a touch of embarrass-
ment which predicated the intimacy of their talk and
the atmosphere of their dream j and again he felt the
everlasting triumph of youth and love in respect to
which he was helpless, which would push him ofF
the boards as a troublesome old supernumerary.

The instant's check passed. Now Robert was
coming forward, still a little embarrassed, but eager,
solicitous. The men shook hands, exchanged some
empty commonplaces ; both self-conscious. Laura
stood beside her lover, glancing at him proudly, and
at her father, whom her eyes at once thanked and en-
treated. Plainly the young man was the important
fact here. Wells understood it as he got himself
away. For a moment he vaguely blamed the self-
ishness of her love, vaguely felt himself lonely.
He went upstairs to his den. His dark eyes glanced
out at the street. The feeling of power and victory
returned. Again there was in his mind the sense
of an immense space in which he stood solitary,
triumphant.

Laura watched her father leave the room. That
indefinable pathos with which he sometimes im-
pressed her, and which she could not understand,
came over her afresh. The departing figure, going
out of the atmosphere of their dream, seemed old,
bent, solitary. A sudden solicitude troubled her
17 257

THE END OF THE DEAL

heart. She felt herself some way to blame because
she had let him go that way. In her joy she had
not only the will, but the need to love him more.
Yet that was so difficult. He was so hard, so
absent.

" I 'm glad of this ! " Robert was saying to her.

She understood that, and was happy with him
over it. The father's concession seemed really im-
portant, as though he were at last giving something
more than a grudging consent. They returned to
their joy. The wedding was to be on the last day
of April.

VIII

The last day of April came singularly fair, a holi-
day, a Sabbath in the serene progress of the seasons.
Wells, glancing from his study window about noon,
caught the wide, bright effect. His shaken mind
dimly and fleetingly conceived a whole sweet, sound,
serene world apart from the murky sphere in which
he lived. For an instant his eye rested with dumb,
hungry sympathy upon a young tree growing in the
parked way beside the boulevard. Then he came
to himself with a little start, found himself staring
vacantly at a mere tree ; took up his coil of thought,
and resumed the restless pacing.

The serene progress of the seasons had not been
favorable to the wheat market. Argentine and the
Northwest seemed to have discovered bottomless
granaries. They poured forth their cargoes of

258

THE END OF THE DEAL

grain in endless processions. Spring had come, and
everywhere there was promise of abundant harvest.
The little threat of war had passed like a swift
cloud. The Powers now smiled as blandly as this
April day. And Bowles — in this crucial day of
doubt — was marching up regiment after regiment
of his inexhaustible reserves, steadily crushing the
market with the slow weight of his millions.

Wells, in his triumph, had rushed on far, too far
— caught in the lure of game, eager to seize the
last possible advantage. He had seen the more
wary of his followers slip away. Some of them had
openly joined the other side. The commercial
writers talked of a decline in the market, adducing
numberless reasons. His money was exhausted ;
but even to himself he would not make the intoler-
able admission that the deal was going to fail. He
stood with his back to the wall, inwardly consumed
with rage to fight it out, rage against his cowardly
followers, rage against the stupid prophets who talked
of defeat, most of all, rage against Bowles.

Pacing with his shuffling gait, he began thinking
of a stroke which might be executed in the Liver-
pool market. Somewhere in the cellarage of his
toiling mind there was the painful consciousness of
a special affliction, — why was he so far from the
office, cut ofF from that instant, telegraphic touch
with the markets which was so important at this
critical time ? He was trimly brushed and shaven.
His lank figure was encased in a long black coat.

259

THE END OF THE DEAL

He wore gray trousers and patent-leather shoes.
This ceremonial garb obtruded upon the hard coil of
his thoughts — of course it was Laura's wedding
which they were preparing downstairs.

He glanced at the little clock on his desk. It
was almost noon. He wondered with a kind of
anguish how long this interruption would last.
Wheat might be anything by this time. He strug-
gled painfully against the need to get to a telephone
and find out what was going on. He heard the
doorbell ringing, and knew that some guests were
downstairs. Glancing out, he happened to see the
young clergyman crossing the street with a vigorous,
swinging step, in the bland sunshine, looking up
smilingly at the house. He found that he disliked
the clergyman, although he had never thought of
him before. He was strangely loath to go down-
stairs. He wished to wait to the last minute so that
there would be no delay and he would not have to
speak to anybody.

There were only a score of guests, all intimates
of the family or of Harper. Coming into the parlor
with Laura, Wells recognized Holiday, who looked
at him with a kind of gloom, and Mrs. Jamieson,
who beamed with a moist fondness at everybody.
The others were familiar, all standing up solemnly
as though it were a funeral.

The little ineffectual snatch of wedding music was
turned off abruptly. The young clergyman began
speaking rapidly in a clear, fresh voice. This was

260

THE END OF THE DEAL

Laura standing before him. Wells was aware of
her graceful figure in a brown travelling dress, of
the mass of her hair. But he avoided looking at
her. The dim black-coated figure beside her was
Harper, of course.

The broker looked straight ahead of him, not
moving a muscle. The clergyman's fresh, rapid
voice ceased. Wells looked around involuntarily.
He saw Harper stoop and kiss the girl's lips before
the roomful, and his heart suddenly clutched together
as though his girl were dead. The bridegroom,
quite pale, inwardly agitated, solemn in his joy,
looked up from his bride's face, and encountered his
father-in-law's eyes, — so astonished, so full of pain,
that the young man suddenly felt ashamed and guilty.
Laura had turned to her mother. They were em-
bracing and shedding tears. The guests were clus-
tering up, nervous, agitated, some of the women
tearful. Harper, in his agitation, took a step for-
ward and held out his hand, with that odd sense of
guilt, dumbly begging to be forgiven. Wells took
the extended hand mechanically, looking into the
young man's eyes with that deep expression of suf-
fering, without anger or resentment, only with pain-
ful surprise as though he were asking helplessly :
"Who are you, young man ? What are you doing
with my girl ? "

But Laura was turning to him, pale and agitated
like Harper. He felt the slight trembling of her
body as he put his hand on her waist. Her agita-

261

THE END OF THE DEAL

tion seemed the visible motion of her spirit. Stoop-
ing to kiss her, her eyes upon his, her emotion
subtly enveloping him, even a faint perfume of her
hair coming to his nostrils, she was suddenly re-
vealed to him — the blown rose — the woman, no
more the girl.

At once he understood it all. She had grown
up. She had come into the woman's power of
creative love. An immense meaning passed be-
tween the father and daughter in a look — as
though she, conscious of her power, asked him,
" Why would n't you let me love you more ? ''
and as though he, astonished, stricken with a
useless regret, replied confusedly, " I did not
understand — no, it cannot go this way — we must
turn back ! "

Mrs. Jamieson stood by, tearful, waiting to kiss
the bride. Wells looked around at his wife, whose
eyes were full of tears.

Every one heard the ring at the doorbell, and
there was a little pause, a little expectant surprise.
Was It a belated guest ? A servant appeared,
bearing a tray on which lay a letter. The man
looked about, smiling slightly, uncertain ; then offered
the letter to Harper. It was directed : " Mr. and
Mrs. Robert Harper." Harper glanced at the super-
scription, recognized the writing, and handed the
letter over to Laura. The guests stood about,
excited, expectant. Laura opened the envelope.
It contained a little slip of yellow paper on which

262

THE END OF THE DEAL

was written, " With best wishes ; " and, pinned to
the slip, was Bowles's check for ;^ 10,000.

Instantly the spirit of the company changed.
There were exclamations, laughter. At once the
solemn air passed away. The tense nerves relaxed
in jokes. The company became gay. Laura, com-
ing back to her joy, and moreover wishing to make
the present seem important because it came from
Robert's relative, gave the check a little triumphant
flourish. Robert was restored to his equanimity.
He was secretly proud of his uncle's generosity.
The ^10,000 in hand was exactly what they needed
to put their money affairs in satisfactory shape. It
redeemed their position economically. He was
happy to have this gift for his bride at so fit a
moment. It quite wiped out that secret, humble
feeling of guilt. The bride and groom and all the
company came back to the joy, the gayety, which
the wedding finally meant. The tragic moment
was overthrown. They were restored to the society
air.

Only Wells was not gay. A dreadful humilia-
tion crushed him. It seemed to him that all these
people, even his own wife and daughter, were com-
paring his conduct with that of Bowles.

He had given nothing but a niggardly consent.
This shame was so great that for a moment he
thought of running out and writing his check for
a larger sum. But that would be a silly imitation.
His shame was childlike in its poignancy. No

263

THE END OF THE DEAL

school boy whose ragged coat is suddenly made
conspicuous could feel a keener, more crushing
humiliation. He felt a mightier rage against Bowles
than he had ever known before, — the fat miller,
flourishing his wealth even at Laura's wedding and
humiliating him this way, pursuing him with his
invincible luck even here. He perceived that he
was left alone. The tragic air was gone. These
people were amusing themselves over Bowles's gift,
over Laura's departure. And in a moment the
whole wedding became contemptible to him, an
afliiction to be borne as patiently as possible. All
other feeling for it died. The sting and burning of
shame and wrath tormented his heart. He wished
to have done with this thing and get back to his
wheat.

The wedding breakfast dragged itself out. Wells
kissed Laura good-bye ; but she was excited by the
departure, by the adieus full of expansive happiness.
There was no meaning in the kiss.

When the guests were gone, Mrs. Wells turned
to her husband.

"Well, I 'm glad they got the money," she said,
smiling, recurring to the surprise.

" Yes," said Wells dryly, as he got his hat. Let
them all go. Let them all admire Bowles. He
was going back to his wheat.

He was aware that Holiday was waiting for him
in the hall.

264

THE END OF THE DEAL

The men left the house together. The moment
the front door closed behind them Holiday burst
out, —

" What does this mean, Wells ? "

The broker looked around in sheer surprise. He
saw Holiday's stumpy barrel-figure, with its wings
of side whiskers, in its ceremonial garb, topped by
a shining silk hat, and he saw that the man was
choking with anger.

" That note from Bowles that you showed me —
it was a forgery ! Bowles is against you. He 's
got you licked. He told me so himself. You
tricked me. I want my money ! " The old mer-
chant's voice trembled with excitement.

Wells instantly understood. Holiday had been
to Bowles. Or Bowles had been to Holiday.

The two men had halted before the door. Now
Wells went down the steps and walked ofF with
rapid strides, without saying a word. He could
not speak. There was a terrible irritation in his
brain. He knew his own guilt ; but it seemed
monstrous, intolerable, that this thing should happen
just now at the crisis when every little thing was so
important. They were all shooting at him at once,
or Bowles, — Bowles was shooting at him from
every corner. He could have broken into impreca-
tions. He could have cursed Bowles aloud in the

265

THE END OF THE DEAL

street. Had not Bowles been delivering him in-
ferior wheat, and had not the inspection department
backed up the miller in thus swindling him ? It all
whirled furiously in his brain. He felt himself
mightily shaken. He dared not stop. He hurried
on without a word.

" Hold on there ! " Holiday yelled, beside himself
at this contemptuous treatment, feeling all the mad-
dening fears of a timid, covetous man who sees a
fortune in peril. " I want to talk to you ! " he
shouted. He ran along the street, puffing, hurrying,
and trotting to keep up with the broker's rapid
stride, quite beside himself with wrath and fear,
wildly accusing Wells.

" You tricked me ! Bowles says you 're an in-
fernal old swindler, and I believe him ! " he said,
panting.

Wells halted abruptly. His mind grew black,
enfolded in something ominous, sinister, beside
which the merchant's fuming wrath was no more
than the petulance of a peevish child. He was still
conscious of that self-control to preserve which he
was striving. Out of the self-control he spoke, in
a very low voice, looking straight ahead.

" Your money 's in the deal. You put it in there.
You can't get it out till the deal 's over. The deal
never wanted money more than now. May deliv-
eries begin to-morrow. If you had any sense you 'd
be looking for more money to put in instead of try-
ing to draw some out."

266

THE END OF THE DEAL

" What ? More money ? Not on your life ! "
Holiday cried, exasperated beyond control by the
impudence of the suggestion.

Wells started off again, shutting his teeth on the
words : " You 're a fool ! "

Holiday followed him to the street-railway tracks
and climbed on the trolley car with him. The car
was full and they could not talk in there. They
took seats on opposite sides of the vehicle. Wells
looking at the floor. Holiday glaring over at him.
Once Wells glanced across, and there flashed in his
brain a vivid picture of Holiday as he had looked
that wintry morning when he came down the stairs,
holding up his trousers with one fat white hand, the
other hand clutching the robe about his chilly neck,
his whiskers all awry ; and at once the broker's mind
was moved to an uncouth amusement. In spite of
himself he grinned broadly, satirically. This was
the last touch for Holiday. Speechless with indig-
nation, he left the car.

In his rapid walk to the office Wells considered
again what Holiday might do. Of course he was
a swindler; yet he wasn't. That was part of the
fearful perversity of things. He felt himself perse-
cuted by a universal stupidity, harked on by Bowles.
It was so senseless, — this girding at him from all
points at once. Luck had suddenly turned into a
swarm of pestiferous flies which buzzed around him
in a maddening cloud. All the flies in the swarm
looked Uke Bowles. Good apple-faced Johnny had

267

THE END OF THE DEAL

a shot ready for him at every corner, — even at his
daughter's w^edding. There v/?ls a terrible irritation
in his mind. But behind everything else vv^as the
stubborn, unbreakable w^ill to fight it out. He
stood quite alone now, his back to the w^all. Let
them come on ! Let them come on ! He vi^ould
fight, fight, fight, to the last ditch.

The office w^as deserted save for half a dozen
clerks. Wells vi^ent to his den and shut the door.
The market had gone against him during the day.
Wheat closed at 91. He u^as long in Chicago, in
Minneapolis, in New York, in Liverpool. The
decline had exhausted about all his money in mar-
gins. Wheat would be deliverable on May con-
tracts in the morning. How much would be
tendered him ? Could he pay for it ? He had
arranged to sell his house, worth ^100,000, for
;^75,ooo. There were some other odds and ends
of his fortune. At his desk he plunged into the
maze of figures and chances. A touch of the old
intoxication, the old lure of the game came back
to him. He still felt subconsciously that terrible
irritation, that unsupportable vexation with every-
thing. But with his work before him he could
bring his mind into order. He was acutely aware
that to-morrow would probably tell the story for him.
His position had grown quite untenable. If he
could disseminate a well-conceived canard in the
morning — something, say, about a big order from
France for wheat — and then buy at Liverpool to

268

THE END OF THE DEAL

give the price an upturn there, the bears might be
stampeded into buying, and the result would be a
market strong enough so that he could unload a
good part of his line without ruinous loss. For it
was now simply a question of unloading, of getting
out. The thing was to trick the traders while he
unloaded without their suspecting it.

He worked on in his den, calculating, scheming,
devising. By and by somebody vaguely annoyed
him by rapping at the office door. Presently he
heard a key grating in the lock. A watchman
clumped through the office, came to the den,
looked in. Wells glowered around at him. The
man apologized. They saw the light; it was so
late they thought something might be wrong. The
broker went on with his work.

The pencil dropped from his fingers. His weary
eyes glanced over the half-dozen memoranda which
represented the plan of campaign. Yes, it would
be fought out in this way, — win or lose. He
straightened up, his back aching. His eyes fell
upon a sandwich, last of the three which he had
had brought in for his dinner. He ate it greedily.
He looked at the coffee cup. Not a drop left.
Mechanically his hand went to his vest-pocket for
a cigar. They were all gone. He got up with
some difficulty, feeling old, cramped, weary, and
went to the water-tank in the office. The water
was lukewarm, but he drank a cupful. Glancing
at the window, he was surprised to find that dav/n

269

THE END OF THE DEAL

was at hand. He looked at his watch. Four
o'clock. Well, it was too late to go home or to a
hotel. He did not care much. He would as lief
stay where he was. He went back to the den,
tilted his chair against the desk, and lifted his legs to
another chair. His head dropped forward. Once
he blinked out and saw the shadowy form of the
building opposite revealing itself in the dim, ghostly
light. His nerves stirred faintly. It was the dawn
of the day of the last battle. But he was too
weary. His chin fell, and he went ofF to sleep.

Wells awoke abruptly. There was shouting and
stamping of feet in the corridor where the janitor's
forces were at work. It was broad daylight. His
first impression was of the sudden burst of the new
day. An immense fear seized him. He had an
appalling sensation of sinking, and he gripped the
arms of the chair, his wide eyes staring out. He
realized at once that it was the opening of the
crucial day. He got up lamely, with some aston-
ishment over that awful visitation of fear. He was
stiff and cramped. There was an odd lameness in
his neck as though he had been hanged. He dragged
his heavy limbs across to a restaurant. The food
and two cups of strong coffee put him on his feet —
but that horrible visitation of fear ! He was still
astonished over it.

270

THE END OF THE DEAL

The day came on with a rush. When the first
telegraph operator came in, the broker called up
New York, and arranged to disseminate that canard
about a big purchase of wheat for export to France.
Another operator came in, and the two instruments
kept up a busy metallic clicking as messages passed
to New York and Minneapolis.

Some traders dropped in, looking at the posted
telegrams, glancing at the newspapers, gossiping
about the market, about politics, about horse-races,
still full of the cheer of breakfast and with fresh-
ened nerves for the new day. Up and down La
Salle Street the brokers' offices were filling up, the
brisk telegraph instruments were clicking inces-
santly. The telephone lines were busy bringing in
messages to buy, to sell. The clerks were at their
places. Floor-brokers were hastily looking over
their orders.

The stock-tickers started to life, buzzing and
grinding out their endless tapes. Opening quota-
tions from Wall Street were put on the blackboards.
The crowds stopped gossiping and watched the figures.

May wheat opened at 9i-|. The game had
begun. Wells, crossing the office floor with a
telegram in his hand, heard the opening price, — a
quarter up.

Three traders in a group in the middle of the
floor were discussing that big order for France.

" You see the price," said Wells, with calm
assurance. " They 've got to have this wheat.

271

THE END OF THE DEAL

The world can't eat bear theories. It 's got to have
wheat."

Not one of the traders saw anything unusual in
the old broker's manner.

He left the office without haste and went up to
the trading-hall. The wheat-pit was a-swarm with
brokers whose shouts and gestures were unintel-
ligible to the uninitiated. Wells skirted the crowd
and saw nothing to dissatisfy him. The market
was strong, advancing. The bears had begun to
buy just as he wished. The trick was working.
One of his men found him, bringing a telegram
from Minneapolis. It said : " Market higher.
Looks strong." This was as he had planned. He
gave the man an order to buy in Minneapolis in
order to help on the strength there. He found that
only a little wheat had been delivered in May con-
tracts. This was in his favor. The intoxication
mounted to his brain. He was aware in every
nerve that the crucial moment had come. But he
kept his head clear by a kind of iron power. The
price advanced a cent. He judged that the time
had come, and he gave the order to sell through
those various agencies which he had carefully pre-
arranged. The trick was to dump his wheat on the
market while the excitement lasted ; to slip from
under his crushing load before the traders could find
out what he was about. He stood at the edge of the
wheat-pit in the swaying skirt of the crowd while
the selling for his account began. Still the market

272

THE END OF THE DEAL

was strong, excited. The buying continued in full
force. His wheat was taken readily. He felt his
pulses pumping and a strong lift in his nerves.
The trick was winning.

As he turned away, he was aware of that lame-
ness in his neck as though he had been hanged, and
he remembered with a dim surprise, as at somethino-
vague, far off, that dreadful, inexplicable visitation
of fear.

Downstairs in the corridor he stopped to buv a
cigar. Two of his customers came up and began
' talking about the market. Wells was willing to
talk, as a general jokes in the tense leisure of a
battle which is going his way. Besides, he knew
that his words, repeated by these men, would have
some effect. Thus ten minutes passed.

Entering his office, he nearly collided with one of
his clerks who was rushing out with a telegram to
find him. Wells saw the excitement in the vouno-
man s face as he reached for the message. It was
from Minneapolis, and it read : " Flood of wheat
coming out here. Market seems likely to break."

The broker looked down gravely at the yellow
sheet. Had some one anticipated his stratagem ?
He walked over deliberately to the ticker which
gave the quotations from upstairs, and at a glance he
saw that the character of the market was changing.
The upward movement was checked. The prices
came lower. He stood by the ticker, unable to get
himself away, watching the figures with a terrible
i8 273

THE END OF THE DEAL

fascination. Another Minneapolis message was
handed him : " Bowles is selling openly."

Yes, of course it was Bowles !

His own selling was going on upstairs ; but some-
body else was selling faster. The price was melting
away with frightful rapidity. It came, 92, 9i|^, 9^^^
9 1 J. 7^his would soon be a rout, a panic. He gave
word to stop the selling on his account. At once
the marker hesitated, rallied a little, turned feebly
upward. In the hope of bringing about another ad-
vance, of definitely turning back the tide. Wells began
to buy. But the Minneapolis messages kept coming
the same : " Bowles selling openly." Soon every
one knew it. The miller was selling. More wheat
was delivered on the May contracts. New York
wired a denial of the report that a big shipment was
to be made to France. The marker turned down-
ward again. The selling continued. The price
sank. Wells felt the trap closing in upon him. He
sent his own men upstairs to buy more in order to
check the rout. He knew that he was taking des-
perate chances. His resources were already utterly
exhausted. He could not pay for the wheat that he
was buying, nor advance the margins on it unless the
market should turn his way. He was using his
credit to rob other men, making trades with them
which he could not carry out. If the market kept
against him, he might ruin them as well as himself.
And as though his buying were a signal, the selling
doubled. They had oceans of wheat to offer. The

274

THE END OF THE DEAL

price still sank. It must be Bowles who was doing
it. The broker felt the miller's vast power steadily-
closing in upon him, tightening about him with its
slow, irresistible coils. The miller's heel was upon
his neck at last. An uncontrollable rage seized him.
He gave orders to buy right and left, knowing it was
simple robbery. If they drove him into a corner, so
much the worse for them ! There was nothing left
of him except the ferocious will to fight.

Still the oceans of wheat poured out. His reckless
buying could not stop the rout. The coils tightened,
tightened, crushing the life out of him. At one
o'clock Bowles gave out a cablegram from France
disposing of the canard. The word went round :
" It was a trick gotten up by Wells." Wheat
dropped to eighty-five cents.

Wells went into his den, his lean figure with its
habitual stoop, his hands hanging at his side, his eyes
glaring down without seeing anything. An implac-
able fury, in which that inexplicable visitation of fear
was strangely blent, possessed his mind.

" I '11 kill him ! I '11 kill him ! " he said over and
over to himself.

The Wells summer-place at Lake Winnebago was
built long before the house on Illinois Boulevard, —
a simple, comfortable cottage, standing alone in the
midst of the wood, about half-way from the village

275

THE END OF THE DEAL

railway station to the spacious procession of parks
and villas along the lake shore, where the later, more
pretentious comers have made their summer places.
From the bench before the cottage the long reach
of red-tile roof capping Bowles's chateau is visible
through the tree-tops.

The road from the village to the chateau and the
villas lies along the lake shore, and is bordered with
shrubs most of the way. From the shore the land
rises in a thick wood, here full of underbrush, there
cleared and carpeted over with sparse, pale wild
grass.

There is another road, a mere rude wagon track,
higher up the slope, walking along which one is in
the heart of the wood, with the water of the lake
shining down below through the tree-trunks and
bushes.

The sun was setting as Wells walked along the
road, bag in hand. A serene mysterious life filled
the woods, giving its veiled voice in the sounds of
insects and birds, suspiring in the warm, damp air
which was full of the smells of growing things.
This serene, mysterious life touched the old broker's
bound spirit. He dimly felt a great, calm, imper-
sonal, indifferent nature which offered him every-
thing and left him free to choose as he pleased.

A kind of light entered his bound mind whereby
for a moment he saw himself in relation to all things,
and he thought : " No, surelv, I will not do this
idiotic thing. How silly and pitiful for one old man

276

THE END OF THE DEAL

to kill another. That would be dreadful and so
foolish ! "

This had come to him dimly several times before,
— when he was buying the things in his bag and
when he was talking to the friendly passenger on
the train ; but never so clearly as now.

It comforted him to think that he could go down
and throw the bag into the water. He walked along
for a moment quite happy in this thought, — that at
any time he could climb down and throw the bag
into the water.

He presently felt again the serene, mysterious life
of the wood, calmly observing him, indifferent to
what he did. In a moment his heart clutched to-
gether; the leaden fear came upon him. He could
not throw the bag into the water. He had no power
to climb down from the upper road, swing forth his
arm, and open his fingers. His will was locked.
Well, if they drove him into a corner so much the
worse for them. That cursed Bowles, who had
ruined him ! He walked on, a lean, stooped figure,
hurrying along the rude wood-road.

Laura sat on the bench before the cottage, watch-
ing the lower road. Wells was almost upon her
before she saw him. She sprang up in a flutter of
surprise, and ran to meet him.

"Why, father!" she cried. Her arm slipped
around him as she kissed him, her eyes shining at
him. " How did you happen to come ? Why
did n't you let us know ? I 'd have met you at the

277

THE END OF THE DEAL

station. Isn't mother coming too? Just a little
lark of your own ? Bob 's down at the village.
You must have come by the wood-road. I was
watching the shore-road for Bob. I 'm so surprised
— and glad ! "

Her speech bubbled forth in a happy effervescence.
The old broker felt her joy in the way she kissed
him, in her shining eyes, in the very motion of her
limbs as she walked beside him, in everything about
her. He felt her bright grace shining into his dark
world.

" I 'm glad,'* she repeated. " I was lonesome to
see you — really." From her glance, and the slight
smiling which touched a dimple in her cheek, he
understood what she meant. He felt the uncon-
scious coquetry of a thoroughly happy woman,
fondly reproaching him a little for not having let her
love him, eager in her own happiness to make him
happy. They came to the bench. " Sit down
until Bob comes," she said ; " I '11 run and see if
the room is ready for you. Let me take your bag."

Without resistance, almost before he knew it, the
bag was in her hand ; she was carrying it to the
house.

He dropped to the bench with one strange, swift
look at his empty hand. How light it felt with
that burden gone ! How light his mind felt ! He
began thinking vaguely that they might arrange to
live there with her through the summer. He had a
hungry wish that Susan were there.

278

THE END OF THE DEAL

It occurred to him presently that Laura did not
know of his scandalous failure on 'Change, with
which by this time the city was clamorous ; and it
came to him with a start of surprise that the failure
was only a few hours old. Yet it seemed to have
happened so long ago !

Meantime Laura was upstairs putting the room to
rights. The bag stood on a chair. In the wish to
do all she could for her father, to render every little
affectionate service, she started to unpack it. She
sprung the catch, opened the bag wide, and lifted out
a nightgown. A sudden, startled arrest locked her
nerves. She stood, the garment in her hands, star-
ing down into the bag. A revolver lay there, ugly,
ominous in its passive deadliness. The polished
tube of steel with its crooked handle held her eyes,
— a thing so hateful, murderous, so far from her
habit. Her startled mind asked, " Why should
• father be carrying that ? " She shuddered a little
without exactly knowing why. She could not bring
herself to touch it, and as though she had uncovered
a detestable secret, she hastily returned the garment
to its place and closed the bag.

Hastening downstairs, still nervous and shaken,
she went to the kitchen to see how the dinner was
coming on ; and in this commonplace occupation
the equilibrium of her mind was presently restored.
To have a revolver was no such extraordinary thing.
She even laughed at herself for her fears. Her
nervousness passed.

279

THE END OF THE DEAL

The matter of the dinner detained her for some
time. When she returned to the bench, it was
growing dusk. Robert was very late. Her fondness
began to create fears for him. She talked to her
dumb father ; but now and then she leaned forward,
peering toward the shore-road through the gathering
dusk ; now and then her speech showed the absent
mind.

" Why, what can have made him so late ? " she
said. " Of course, it 's quite safe here. Still there
are tramps about. You know, they held up a man
on the other side of the lake last week. One ought
to use some caution. Robert himself spoke of it
last night when we were sitting here. You know,
Mr. Bowles still comes up on the 8.45 and walks
home along the shore-road. I don't think he ought
to — do you ? And he said he 'd be back for din-
ner at seven. Of course he's all right — only I
wish he M come. Shall we eat now, or wait ? "

" Let 's wait," said Wells.

He heard his own voice sounding in the dark.
Her fear infected him in a strange way. Something
vast, mysterious, impersonal, full of fate, moved in
the darkening wood. He felt it moving, and was
aware of a little hot, quick, rodent-like fear of it as
he sat speechless, staring into the dusk. Pictures
came and went in his brain — the wheat pit — Holi-
day on that wintry morning and Holiday on the
street corner — four fellow-brokers to whom he had
given buying orders coming into his office when his

280

THE END OF THE DEAL

failure was noised about and cursing him for a thief.
All the time that living thing moved in the dark
wood, drawing him on, observing him.

Presently Laura got up to ease her nerves and
went to the house, where she tried to busy herself
for a few moments. She came back, stood by the
bench awhile, really frightened now ; then went
away toward the shore, where any moving figure on
the road would show against a patch of shining
water. Wells watched her go, leaving him with his
fate.

When she came back she saw that her father had
left the bench. Entering the house, she encountered
him coming out. The rays of the hall lamp fell
upon the two faces turned to each other in a swift,
wordless glance. An indefinable shock passed
through the woman. In the set look of the older
face, with eyes singularly leaden, yet bloodshot, she
thought she read a fear for Robert, justifying her own
fear. She could not speak — as though speaking
would bring forth the fear into an accomplished
tragedy. Wells went out. Laura dropped into a
chair, looking about her, trying to control her fear
and think of something to do. She heard the far,
faint whistle of the Chicago train — the 8.45.

It may have been two minutes later that she
heard the strong, rapid step on the porch, sprang up,
and rushed into her husband's arms.

281

THE END OF THE DEAL

XII

With Bob in her arms, strong and sound under
the cosey light of their lamp, all her fears instantly
became a dear joke — as though gay life had for an
instant put on a horrid mask in a prank to frighten
her, then whisked it aside, laughing at her for the start
she gave. The mask gave a new inspiration, a new
zest to joy. She laughed, hugging him and laughing
again, smothering him with endearments while she
scolded him for staying.

Then she saw there was something else. Harper
took a folded newspaper from his pocket.

"Your father 's failed, Laura," he began ; and he
told her briefly what had happened. At once she
understood her father's unexpected appearance. She
stood looking up at her husband, wordless, stricken
through and through with pity.

" Oh, poor father ! Poor papa ! He 's here.
Bob, you know. He came here. Poor father ! "

" Here ? But your mother telegraphed. They
gave me the wire at the station. That 's what kept
me. Strange — nobody saw him. He must have
jumped off at the water-tank. Your mother wired
to know if he was here."

" Then she does n't know ! You must go back at
once, Bob, and wire her. At once. Bob ! She
does n't know where he is. Go at once, dear.
Poor papa! He came to me — came to me in this
trouble. How I love him ! " At once she remem-

282

THE END OF THE DEAL

bered. She clapped her hands to her face, dropped
them, stood looking at her husband a statue of
remorse.

" Oh, I 've failed ! I *ve failed again ! " she
cried. " He came to me. I Ve failed ! I was so
full of you, so anxious about you I almost forgot
him. Maybe he 's gone away again. Maybe I 've
let him go away again. We '11 find him ! I '11 go
with you." It occurred to her that he might not
have gone away. "You look for him at the station,
in the village. Bob. Go to the hotel. Inquire. If
you find him, make him come back. I '11 wait there.
We '11 surely find him. But wire mother first."

In her eagerness she forgot the dinner. When
Harper set off, she ran out to the bench. It was
empty. She returned to the house. In a moment
she picked up the evening paper at which she had
barely glanced. Even the headlines told her more
than Harper had said. She read hastily, but enough
to see that it was more than simple failure. It was
utter ruin, disgrace, dishonor. She read of Holiday's
accusation and of the fellow-brokers who had cursed
Wells in his office.

She dropped the paper, trembling, her lips apart,
her face colorless, staring into a void. In the void
there slowly gathered and took form an open travel-
ling-bag.

At the door of Wells's room she struck a match,
steadying herself with one hand on the door-jamb
and peering in. The swift light brought out various

283

THE END OF THE DEAL

familiar things, — the bureau, chairs, the untouched
bed. The room was still and empty. She lit the gas
and turned to the bag, her heart laboring to beat.
The revolver vi^as gone.

Rushing downstairs and out of doors, bareheaded,
she took to the wood-road without any reason,
running as fast as she could over the difficult footing,
striving to see through the gloom, every instant
yearning with wild anxiety toward the human figure
erect or prostrate which might be revealed out of each
patch of shadow ahead or aside. The dark was pop-
ulous with this solitary figure which faded each in-
stant from her breathless haste. Bodily fatigue and
the mockery of the dusk, which each moment silently
engulfed the object of her search, imposed a certain
perception of the order and relationship of things
upon her distracted mind. Why in this direction
rather than another ? Still she hurried on from the
original impulse. The dark and silence of the wood
lay about her. Here she stumbled. Now and then
an overhanging bough, dewily fragrant, whipped her
face, like a feeler of the still, mysterious Hfe within
the wood reaching out to take account of her.
Everywhere this wide, serene summer night, silent
in its intense secret life, seemed to know what she
wanted and indifferently to hide it from her.

She dragged wearily back to the cottage. The
endless shadows were saturated with an impenetrable
and sentient repose. The dark shapes of trees in
the front yard seemed never to have stirred since

284

The dusk . . . silently engulfed the object of her search "

THE END OF THE DEAL

time was — set to watch. The house itself was
now dark, its dim form holding itself far and indif-
ferently remote from her. Her limbs were heavy,
but she had not found him. Everywhere the still
dark, within some of whose impenetrable folds the
tragedy was happening, baffled her search. It knew

— it knew — but she could not find out.

She climbed up the steps and opened the front
door, calling to the maid. There was no answer.
Robert was not there. The tragedy had devoured
them all. She crept upstairs to her father's room.
Again the swift light brought up the familiar objects,

— the bureau, chairs, the untouched bed. The in-
animate repose of those homely things seemed to
allege her loss. Their cruel changelessness held the
secret, as though they were his body immutably
resolved into that silent, sentient world which had
swallowed him up.

She lay cuddled and shivering, wide-eyed, on the
hall lounge, when sounds of human life abruptly
invaded the silent, sentient void, — the breaking of
twigs, a muffled noise of horses, a subdued voice.
At the door she made out a carriage standing in the
rough road before the cottage; human figures bearing
a burden.

They brought him in — Bowles, Robert, and a
servant — and laid him on the lounge.

She made out that Robert had come up with
them just before they reached the house. Bowles
was still explaining it to him.

285

THE END OF THE DEAL

" I was walking home, you know," he said," and
I thought I saw somebody by a clump of bushes.
The man stepped out. It was Wells. I stopped
short. He had a pistol. He lifted it up. I
could n't say anything ; I just looked at him. He
turned it to his own breast and fired. I could n't
say anything, you know. I just looked at him.
He aimed at himself. It was just where the road
turns from the shore."

The miller's voice broke and trembled over these
short, labored utterances. His broad face was per-
fectly white. He stared from one to the other.
In the intervals of laboring speech his nether lip
hung loose, slightly quivering.

" He stepped out in front of me — " the miller
repeated it, dreadfully shaken, half stupefied by his
agitation. His fearing eye glanced down at the
form on the lounge.

The old broker's composed and colorless face
seemed to scorn the miller's agitation. Serene with
its locked secrets and this final secret of death, it
seemed to take an immortal triumph at last over
Bowles with all his luck and power and money.

"The doctor must be here ! " Bowles was crying
in his agitation.

Laura sat beside the couch. In her first percep-
tion she had caught the faint movement of the
breast, the slight sigh, the quiver of the lip. She
had scarcely heeded anything else. Life was still
here. Her whole concern bent itself to that with

286

THE END OF THE DEAL

single, tense regard. Without an exclamation or
so much as a gesture she sat beside the couch, hold-
ing his inert hand, her eyes bent upon his face.
His life had been brought back to her out of the
mystery. The composed, colorless features, with
their strange effect of scorn, locked in all his secrets.
He whom love had missed lay in the state of his
impenetrable solitude. What far, lonely, secret ways
he had gone ! The woman bent over him, her eyes
yearning with the will to bring him home.

XIII

Wells sat on the bench before the cottage, the
hot woods droning under a July sun. Mrs. Wells
sat just within the screen door to the hall, looking
out every moment or two at the lean, bent, solitary
figure.

The broker's bodily strength had returned slowly.
The town house was closed and advertised for sale.
Back in that teeming hive they were sweeping up
the last litter of the failure which had already passed
into history, excepting now and then for a belated
wail over the meagreness of the debris. Wells had
not been to town. There was no attempt to dis-
turb him here. He had already passed from the
stage, which was busy with other actors. His wife
and daughter had been beside him continually. But
now that he was stronger and able to get about they
were no longer near him.

287

THE END OF THE DEAL

The little fiction which Bowles and Robert and
the doctor had made up about an attack by a high-
wayman had been accepted politely, simply because
it was so hopelessly transparent. Every one knew
that the ruined broker had attempted suicide.

When the strength began coming back to his
limbs, it brought in the inextinguishable shame of
this fact. The failure was tolerable. Plenty of
other men failed. But the humiliation of having
attempted suicide. No one could know the dark
struggle of his spirit which issued in turning the
weapon against himself instead of against Bowles.
But even the two loving women who watched by
his bed, — their tender solicitude seemed to pity him
for a weak, idiotic old man who had tried ineffect-
ually to kill himself like a lovesick girl.

In his shame he wished to be alone. The whims
of a convalescent must be humored, and the two
loving, anxious women sadly gave him his way.

But the last two weeks a more alarming symptom
had appeared. Daily Wells spent hours locked in
his room. The helpless mother and daughter, met
with the hard armor of his old aloofness and ab-
straction, knew what it meant. They already saw
him giving himself back into the coils of his passion.
They imagined him, in his locked room, spending
hours scheming, devising, plotting, meditating, plan-
ning a stroke to recover his fortune, putting forth
his practised old mind in preparations for a new
campaign.

288

THE END OF THE DEAL

Wells arose from the bench and entered the
house, stubbornly avoiding his wife's anxious eye
and ignoring Laura's call. He mounted the stairs
with labor and went to his room.

Half an hour later Laura went up noiselessly, as
she had gone up before. But this time a narrow
crack appeared between the edge of the door and
the casing. He had forgotten to lock himself in.
She put her hand to the door and entered the room,
her heart beating high.

Wells sat in a large old rocking-chair beside the
window. A broad lap-board lay across his knees.
He had a deck of cards and was playing solitaire.

Laura halted abruptly, with an inexpressible shock.
Wells jerked his head around, his wide eyes startled,
defensive, guilty. For a big instant the glances of
the father and the daughter hung dumbly together ;
and the truth lay revealed between them.

The broker's mind, still helpless in his weakness
and amid the ruins of his business, but worn to old
habits, occupied itself with this childish imitation of
the old game. He sat in here by the hour shuffling
and distributing the cards, childishly absorbed in
the shifts of chance, like a ruined Napoleon playing
with tin soldiers.

A dull, pathetic blush colored his lean wrinkled
old cheek in the nakedness of his shame.

" Go away ! Go away ! " he commanded harshly,
but in a voice which trembled.

Laura rushed upon him, flung herself beside his
19 289

THE END OF THE DEAL

chair, seized his trembling hands. " No ! No !
I won't go away, father ! Never ! I '11 never go
away again ! " She bent over his hands, kissing
them, her tears wetting them.

" Go away, girl ! Go away ! " his shaking voice
repeated. " Go away, girl ! " His own dry old
eyes ran with tears. " I ain't worth it, Laura ! I
ain't worth it ! "

" No ! No ! Never ! Never ! I '11 never go
away again, father ! " She still kissed his hands,
wet with her tears. "We'll never go away again,
father ! Mother ! Mother ! " she called loudly.

290

PRINTED FOR A. C. McCLURG & CO. BY
THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, JOHN WILSON
& SON (INC.), CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A.

!11?,"T"^'"^ ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY

3 1211 00696944 4

MMMMMiitfllla> MUMMSfiaMIMB